


Away We Go

by Gin_Juice



Series: picture book [18]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: :(, Beaches, Embedded Images, Family Fluff, No Apocalypse, Physical Journeys, Post-Canon, Postcards, Spiritual Journeys, i am really just very sad that i can't go to the beach so i wrote a 3 part story about it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:09:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 34,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25205260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gin_Juice/pseuds/Gin_Juice
Summary: "Guys. Guys, I think we fucked up.""Do you mean 'we' or do you mean 'you?'""We. This was a group effort fuck-up and you know it."----------------------------How the Hargreeves spent their summer vacation.
Relationships: The Hargreeves Family
Series: picture book [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1335751
Comments: 202
Kudos: 375





	1. June

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a series, but you don't have to read previous installments to follow along. Actually, yeah you kind of do, so here's a summary.
> 
> LUTHER lives at the Academy and has taken up gardening. He also got roped into doing guest speaking events about space and being an astronaut for elementary school students.
> 
> DIEGO moved into the Academy after Pogo left and continues his work as a janitor/The Batman.
> 
> ALLISON visits frequently from Los Angeles and has recently been forced by contractual obligations to star in a terrible movie.
> 
> KLAUS is sober, living at the Academy, attending cosmetology school, and really good at making Dave and Ben physical.
> 
> FIVE lives at the Academy and is renovating it in lieu of drinking all day. He's penpals with a mathematician from Brazil.
> 
> BEN is dead and loving it. He's made friends with other not-crazy ghosts he met through Dave, and owns a pair of cats.
> 
> VANYA still has her apartment, but is getting along much better with her siblings. She's a member of an amateur pool league and is in lesbians with one of her teammates. The only person who knows about that so far is Five.
> 
> There are also OCs:  
> -Random Old Man Ghost, who hangs around the Academy and tries to lecture the Hargreeves into being real people  
> -Cora & Angelo, a pair of ghosts who are friends with Dave, and now Ben, too  
> -Jillian, Klaus's friend from school  
> -and Katie, Vanya's gf
> 
> Thank you for reading my introductory essay. Here, have a story.

One of the last places Allison would have chosen to spend the summer was in Florida. Then again, one of the last movies she would have chosen to work on was the one she was about to star in, so it was probably time to adjust to not always getting her own way.

It… kind of sucked. But she was determined to make the most of it.

“Oh, I’d love to go visit you,” said Luther. “But the YMCA is doing this science camp thing, and they asked me to go talk about space at it.”

“Oh!” Allison smiled. She had sort of assumed that the school year being over would mean he’d turn back into a hermit, so this was a nice surprise. Look at him going out and doing things! “Well, that’s great! But we’re going to be filming for at least two months—you could come down afterwards.”

Luther shifted uncomfortably in the driver’s seat. He had just picked her up from the airport—her last visit to NYC before Florida—and they were currently stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the freeway.

A billboard in front of them was inviting them to _“Come On Down To Big Lou’s, Off Exit 26!”_ There was zero indication of what Big Lou’s was, but they’d been sitting there so long that Allison was starting to think that maybe they should pay him a visit anyway.

“Right. It’s just, uh. Well, they’re doing six sessions that each last a week, so I’m booked for every Thursday from the end of June until early August.”

“So come down on a Friday and leave on Wednesday.”

“Okay, yeah, maybe,” Luther said, not quite meeting her eyes. “I’ll have to see.”

He strummed his fingers on the steering wheel, then pointed out the window. “Hey, what do you think Big Lou’s is?”

So that was probably a no-go, but she couldn’t claim to be shocked. Getting Luther on an airplane was a big ask.

Lucky for her, she had five other people who would have a much easier time fitting into the seats.

“When would I go to Florida?” Diego asked. He dropped his weights to the floor of their home gym. “I have a full-time job, you know.”

“You can take some time off, can’t you?” She flashed him a winning smile. “I have so many frequent flier miles racked up it’s crazy. You could fly there and back, like, ten times over for free.”

They had all inherited more money than a reasonable person could hope to spend in a lifetime, but Diego refused to touch his. She’d never worked out how he managed to cover his share of the bills in a house so big and energy-inefficient on the salary of a gym janitor, but her best guess was that Five low-balled him when it came time to collect.

Diego wiped the sweat from his brow. “I don’t need you to pay for me, and I’ve never taken a day off, ever,” he said.

The pride in his voice might have been understated, but it was impossible to deny. And _maybe_ a bit misplaced.

“So all the times you just didn’t show up to work because there were criminals to catch don’t count, huh?”

He rose from the weight bench and gave her a jovial clap on the shoulder. “I’m staying here to do my job, and you go to Florida to do yours, and when you die of heat stroke, I’ll write you a nice eulogy. Fly safe, sis.”

Well, fine. Not everyone had to work all summer.

Vanya set the glasses of iced tea down on her kitchen table and hesitated. “Well… Yeah, I mean, that’s true, the orchestra’s on break. But I still have a few students taking private lessons.”

“’A few?’” Allison repeated. “How many is that?”

Vanya winced. “Two,” she admitted. “A lot of the kids are doing music programs and stuff right now. But, um. I also have pool? So.”

“Speaking of pools!” Allison rummaged around in her purse and pulled out a brochure. “I’m renting a house for while I’m there, and it has one. Look, isn’t it nice?”

Instead of taking it, Vanya squeezed her elbows. “I get sunburned really easy,” she whispered in apology.

Okay. _That_ was a lame excuse, but whatever. There was one person who she knew was always up for an adventure.

Klaus raised his sunglasses and sat up from the chair where he was tanning. “Villas del Calamar,” he read from the brochure. He shot a grin at her. “Ha, you know ‘calamar’ means squid?”

“It looks really nice, though,” Ben commented, examining the pictures from over his shoulder. “We could go.”

Klaus hummed and passed the brochure off to Dave. “I don’t think so.” He waved a lazy hand. “School, and whatnot. I’m a busy bee!”

“Don’t you have some time off?” asked Allison, sitting down next to him. “Around the 4th of July?”

He slid his sunglasses back into place. “I have prior commitments.”

Dave flipped to the last page of the brochure. “You mean helping Jillian move? Did she finally settle on a place?”

“That’s only going to take a day,” Ben protested, frowning. “Not even a day. C’mon, dude, going on vacation would be so fun.”

Finally, some traction!

“The development is all brand new, so not many ghosts, I bet,” Allison jumped in eagerly. “Plus the beach is only twenty minutes away, and we’re doing most of the filming downtown, so you could go out and do stuff there while I’m on set.”

“Wow, you really want us to visit, don’t you?” Klaus remarked. “I _know_ you aren’t this bad at taking a hint.”

Allison beamed at him and crossed her fingers in her lap. “So you’ll come?”

“Nope!” he trilled, flopping over onto his stomach to tan his back. “If I go on vacation, I’m picking a place that isn’t nine billion degrees. But you have fun melting in Squid City!”

She looked to Ben in desperation.

“If I went by myself, you wouldn’t know I was there,” he pointed out.

…Fine. Fine! She’d done her best, and if none of them wanted to visit, she couldn’t force them. She went out of her way all the time to visit them, and it would be nice if somebody returned the favor, but—

Allison paused in her trek up the stairs. Five was there, coming down, and he paused, too.

She eyed him cautiously. “Hey, Five. Do you have any interest in going to Flor—“

He vanished.

Allison sighed.

It was going to be a long summer.

{}{}{}{}{}

The gym was bumping when Diego arrived.

There were two big fights coming up, one on Friday night and one on Saturday, and one of their new kids, Landry, was prepping for a tournament.

Energy had been running high and tempers had been flaring hot, but Al still found the time to hone in on Diego like a hawk the moment his foot was through the door.

“You’re ten minutes late!” he yelled across the gym.

“So I’ll stay ten minutes extra,” Diego called back without breaking his stride. “Floors are getting cleaned either way, aren’t they?”

Al said something under his breath that was probably absolutely charming, then climbed down from the side of the ring with more than a little difficulty.

Diego stopped to watch. Someday, Al’s knees were going to quit on him altogether and he’d take a header straight to the floor. But this time, he managed to stick the landing. _This_ time.

“Know what your problem is, Hargreeves?” he said, out of breath. “No passion. You don’t give a single sloppy shit about this place or what you do here.”

Diego bit back a snort. “Sorry I don’t have more zeal for mopping,” he said. “But, again— _the floors are getting cleaned either way.”_

Al’s jowls quivered like an angry bulldog. “Got plenty of fuckin’ zeal for running around all night playing cops and robbers, though, don’t you?” he demanded. “Put that to use somewhere else, and maybe you wouldn’t _be_ mopping floors.”

That stung a lot more than Diego wanted to admit. He had come to Al with little more than the clothes on his back and a willingness to work, and he thought Al had respected that, his determination to make his own way in the world.

“So, what?” he asked gruffly. “Am I fired, or were you just in the mood to give me shit?”

Al deflated. It seemed that wasn’t the answer he’d wanted, though Diego couldn’t begin to guess what would be.

“You’re not fired,” he said, with an air of disappointment. “Just get to work, Hargreeves.”

Well, _fine_ , that was all he’d wanted to do in the first place. Diego watched him accept a hand from one of the coaches to climb back up to the ring, already barking instructions at the fighters inside of it.

He turned around and started towards the supply closet.

Sometimes, he swore Al’s mind was going in his old age.

{}{}{}{}{}

Ben stretched out on the sofa and sighed.

On the floor, Klaus leaned further over the coffee table, intent on his nail art. “Stop moving your hand,” he scolded Dave.

Ben sighed again.

“I’m not moving my hand.”

“You are, David! The rhinestones are going to be crooked, and do you _want_ to look like a dumbass with crooked sparkle fingers?”

Ben sighed a third time. Loud. More of a sustained _‘HYUUUUUHNH’_ than a sigh, really.

“Yes, Ben-jungle-gym?” asked Klaus, frowning at Dave’s nails. “Can we help you?”

“No.” He kicked at the arm of the couch, and a cat paw reached up to swipe at his shoelaces. “I just wish I had something to do.”

“Go play with matches,” Klaus suggested. “That’s what I do when I’m bored.”

Dave smiled at him like he had hung the moon.

“No, I mean I wish we had plans for the summer.” Ben studied them through his lashes, winding the drawstring of his hoodie around one finger. “All my friends are going away.”

Angelo was at a cheese festival somewhere in Wisconsin—he went every year, he’d said, because it smelled like cheese—and Cora had headed back to the Philippines that very morning. She’d told him that if he wanted to come, she would be hanging around the airport in Manila on the 9th of August, but he hadn’t made up his mind yet.

It was a little intimidating, thinking about traveling that far, and alone.

It’d be nice to go somewhere with family first. Dip his feet in the pool, so to speak, and see if he liked the water.

Klaus jabbed the nail polish brush in his direction. “Stop asking to go to Florida, young man, or I’m turning this car around.”

“We could go north,” Dave chimed in. “There are some nice vacation spots in New England.”

Ben watched Klaus’s reaction hopefully.

“Well… okay,” he said after a second. “If we can figure out how to get there, I guess.”

Dave nudged his left knee against Klaus’s right one. “It’d be a blast,” he said. “You like to swim, and I like to watch you in a swimsuit. Everybody wins.”

Ben rolled his eyes while Klaus batted his lashes coyly.

“You don’t think I’m gangly?” he asked, in the faux-innocent way he had when he was fishing for compliments. “This girl Gennifer-with-a-G in my class said I was gangly behind my back yesterday.”

“Aw, fuck her.” Dave leaned over to smack a kiss against the side of his cheek. “You look juicy enough to eat to me.”

Klaus wriggled around in delight. “Oh, _stop.”_

“Yeah, for real,” Ben agreed, watching in distaste as Dave pretended to nip at Klaus’s fingers. “Stop. _Please.”_

Jesus. If anything could sweeten the prospect of solo-travel, it would be a few days of sharing a hotel room with these two.

{}{}{}{}{}

“—talked to Claire earlier, by the way,” Allison said in Vanya’s ear. “I’m pretty sure she thinks that every time I leave California, I’m visiting you guys, because she kept asking to say hi to everybody.”

She laughed. “I got in big trouble when she found out I was the only one here. She wanted to tell Aunt Vanya that she learned how to play the piano.”

Vanya switched the phone to her other side as she flipped the omelet she was making. “Oh, is she taking lessons?”

“No,” said Allison. “She has this toy keyboard that plays The Itsy Bitsy Spider when you press a button. I’m not saying you guys _shouldn’t_ start a band, but your repertoire’s going to be a little limited.”

Vanya smiled into phone and added pepper to the eggs. “I can work with that.”

Allison laughed again. There was a whooshy sound in the background, and when Vanya focused all of her considerable ear power on it, she thought it was the splash of water. She must be sitting by the pool, she guessed.

“Have you given any more thought to coming down?” Allison asked, as though she had read her mind. “I have three guest bedrooms and lots of sunblock, so there’s all the ingredients you need for a killer vacation right there.”

Vanya bit at her lip. She _knew_ the sunburn excuse was too stupid to work. The truth was, she had one very good reason to stay in New York all summer, and that reason was fast asleep in her bed as they spoke.

“I… I have thought about it, actually,” she said. “I, um…”

 _Just tell her,_ she commanded herself. _Tell her. You can’t hide it forever. Tell her!_

“I… don’t think I can.”

After a beat of silence, she added “Sorry.”

“Oh,” said Allison. The splashing had stopped. “Well, that’s okay. Let me know if anything changes?”

Bedsprings groaned in the other room, and a voice that had become as familiar to her as her own yawned, “Vee?”

“Of course,” Vanya promised hastily. “I have to go, so—talk soon?”

“I’ll be here.”

She hung up, and felt only a twinge of guilt over how glum Allison had sounded.

{}{}{}{}{}

Luther stepped into the blessed cool of the foyer and heaved a sigh of relief.

The YMCA didn’t have a formal dress code— thank God—so at least he didn’t need to wear a blazer to Space Day, but it was still too hot for long sleeves. He’d been deeply envious of the grad student running the thing, who had looked cool as a cucumber in a T-shirt and cargo shorts.

He’d also looked hungover as hell. Luther didn’t envy him that at all—it was sort of awe-inspiring to watch kids get excited about science, but they didn’t need to be so loud about it.

“Hello, Luther dear!” Mom said as he opened the door to the kitchen.

Diego was sitting at the table and offered a wordless grunt by way of greeting. He was munching on a protein bar with a glass of flaxseed milk sitting off to his left. It was four in the afternoon, so whether that was his breakfast, lunch, or dinner was anybody’s guess—Luther had never been able to find any rhyme or reason to his schedule.

Their mother placed a tray of oatmeal cookies on a cooling rack and smiled at him. “How did your presentation go?”

“Pretty well, I think.” He maneuvered around her to retrieve the pot of iced coffee from the fridge. “They made a rocket out of a plastic bottle and a bicycle pump. The kids seemed to like it.”

“Behold, the wonders of space,” Diego muttered into his milk.

Luther ignored him. He was feeling good. His talk had gone off without a hitch, and the kids had had fun, and now he was going to… putter around in the garden, he supposed. Maybe read a book. Wait until next Thursday.

He spooned sugar into his coffee, trying to push aside the strange, niggling feeling of discontent that had come over him.

The door swung open. “Good afternoon, all!” Klaus looked between them, beaming. “Two of my favorite people, in one convenient location! It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.”

Diego took an unimpressed bite of his protein bar. “Cut to the chase and tell us where you want a ride.”

“Rhode Island.”

Luther looked up sharply from his coffee. “What? Why? What’s in Rhode Island?”

“Right now? No idea!” Klaus sashayed over to Diego and sniffed at his milk. “But next week, there’s going to be me, and Ben, and Dave, and the handsome devil who drove us there.”

Diego pulled his glass away. “Let us know when you meet him.”

“Oh, come on, it’ll be so much fun! The four of us—or the five of us!—on a beach, eating lobster, getting tans…. uhh…” He shimmied his hips as he thought. “Enjoying all of the many other amenities I’m sure Rhode Island has to offer?”

“Rhode Island has fifteen active lighthouses,” their mother informed them as she dolloped more cookie dough onto a baking sheet. “It’s thirty-seven miles wide and forty-eight miles long, and has four hundred miles of coastline. Its elevation is two hundred feet.”

Klaus snapped his fingers and pointed to her. “See, there you go. Amenities!”

Diego tossed the balled-up wrapper from his protein bar at him.

Luther sipped slowly at his coffee. That was such a random place to go, and Klaus couldn’t have been planning it for more than a day or two. It was crazy how people just... decided to do stuff like that. How they just got up and went out. And _liked_ it.

He couldn’t imagine living on the edge that way. He had felt out of sorts when the grocery store up the street was closed for renovations and he’d had to go to a different one.

“I’m not driving you all the way to Rhode Island,” Diego was saying. “Best I can do is the bus station. Take it or leave it.”

“Oh, I can’t go by bus,” said Klaus. “Greyhound banned me ages ago.”

Diego eyed him over his glass. “Why?” he asked. “What did you do?”

Klaus met his gaze with equanimity.

“Do you really want an answer to that?”

{}{}{}{}{}

“—so I need off from Friday until July 2nd,” Diego explained to Al. “I’ll wax the floors Thursday night, and they should hold up alright until I get back.”

Al gave him a hard look from behind his desk. “And this is so you can go on vacation,” he said, for the third time.

“Yes, Al. It’s so I can go on vacation.”

“To Rhode Island.”

“Yes, Al. My plans haven’t changed since I walked in here. We’re still going to Rhode Island.”

Al crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair.

“Bullshit.”

Diego took a deep breath in through his nose and imagined the space around them was filled with curse words, comic book-style. It was an old coping mechanism, but it still helped him refrain from saying them out loud.

“All I’m looking for is a yes or a no, Al.”

“What is it this time, Hargreeves?” he continued, like he hadn’t heard him. “You gonna go undercover with a drug cartel? Or are you just tailing the neighborhood pot guy upstate while he visits his grandma?”

“I’m not in the habit of tailing neighborhood pot guys, Al.”

“Christ, this job is dead fuckin’ last on your priorities, isn’t it?” He glowered at Diego across the desk. “Why the hell do I keep you around?”

“Because you need a janitor, Al.”

“Aw, fuck the janitor, I need a vacation!” He leaned forward, eyes boring holes into Diego’s. “ _I_ need a vacation.”

Okay. Pretend curse words weren’t going to cut it here.

Diego threw up his hands. “Then fucking take one!” he said, as baffled as he was frustrated. “Holy shit, you asshole, nobody is stopping you!”

Al eased back in his seat. He wasn’t given to sulking, but… he looked an awful lot like he was sulking. Christ, he was getting weird lately.

“Can I have those days off or not?”

“Do whatever you want,” Al said, sounding defeated. He pointed his pen at the door. “Now get outta my office. I’m working.”

Diego wanted nothing more than to slam the door as hard as he could, but instead he deliberately left it open a crack so the cold from the air conditioner could escape.

“YO! Hargreeves!” Al called after him. “You think electricity is free?”

He smiled to himself as he jogged down the stairs.

Dickhead.

{}{}{}{}{}

Ben wandered into the living room as Klaus was trying to cram one last pair of shoes into his duffel bag.

“You all packed?” he asked.

“Yep!”

He gave up and stowed the shoes under the sofa for safekeeping. Whatever, he probably wouldn’t need leather boots for the beach, anyway.

Ben gave him a critical look. “You sure about that?”

Klaus sat back on his heels and ran through his list. Bathing suit, check. Toothbrush, check. Socks, no need, he’d just borrow Diego’s. Eyeliner, check.

“Positive,” he announced. He saluted with a stick of deodorant. “Prepared for every eventuality!”

Ben sighed. “All your underwear is in the laundry room, dude. Like, literally all of it.”

It should probably bother him more that Ben was keeping tabs on every individual piece of his undergarments, but Klaus figured _someone_ around here had to.

“Oh, I don’t need any of that,” he said. “Who wears undies in the summer? What am I, the mayor?”

Before Ben could respond, Five materialized in the middle of the room with an armful of papers.

His eyes skimmed over Klaus’s luggage. “You’re off, then?”

“As soon as Diego gets home from work,” Ben told him, scooping one of his cats up from an armchair. He kissed the top of her head. “You and Luther have to remember to feed the babies and change their litter while we’re gone, okay?”

“I’ll remember to feed them,” said Five.

“Ooh, and can you save the obituaries for Dave?” Klaus asked. “He likes to check and see if anybody he grew up with died.”

It was so morbid, yet also so wholesome. Dave was the fucking best.

“And our library books are due tomorrow,” said Ben. “Could you return them?”

“And watch my shows for me and write down what happens,” Klaus instructed. “I don’t want to miss anything.”

It was all reruns in the summer, but he always forgot what had happened during the regular season. A whole hour was _so long_ to pay atten—Wait, how much cigarettes cost in Rhode Island? Maybe he should buy a carton while they were there.

Five scowled at them. “Anything else you need? I really can’t think how I’m going to fill the time while you’re away.”

Klaus considered it. “No, I think that’s it.”

Ben set the cat down as she began trying to claw her way to freedom. “Hey,” he said to Klaus. “What about the old guy? The ghost? Have you seen him lately?”

Now that he mentioned it, it had been a while. Huh.

“Nope.” Klaus frowned a little. “Maybe he’s on his own vacation?”

“Oh, yeah. Maybe.” Ben glanced around the room as though he was expecting him to pop up at any minute. “What if he comes around while we’re gone? I don’t want him to worry something happened to us.”

Five plopped down on the couch and began sorting through sheets of equations. “What would have happened to _you?_ ” he asked Ben.

Klaus shot him a dirty look. Rude!

“I’m going to leave a note on the fridge,” Ben decided, grabbing a pen and pad of post-its Five had just put down. He turned back to Klaus. “What’s his real name?”

Klaus blinked. “Uh… Sir?”

Ben frowned at him.

“Mr. Ghost,” Klaus tried. “King Kangaroo. Old Man Australia. Scooter. I don’t know!”

“How do you not know?” Ben asked, exasperated.

“How do _you_ not know?”

“I’d go with ‘Scooter,’ if I was you,” Five commented, flipping a page over. “That’s probably it.”

Ben sighed and started to raise a hand to his forehead, then froze. “Hang on. Does he know _our_ names? I don’t think I’ve ever heard him use them.”

Klaus crammed his stick of deodorant into his back pocket. “He must,” he said. “How can you hang around with people for a full year and never find out what their names are?”

…Oh.

Wait.

Ben shook his head. “Maybe Dave knows.”

Once he’d left, a cat on his heels, Klaus leaned over to flick Five’s knee.

“Any big plans for while we’re gone?” he asked.

Five scribbled something on a piece of graph paper. “You’re looking at it.”

Klaus squirmed on the floor. It was maybe-probably stupid to worry about Five, who was hands down the all-time world champion at taking care of himself, but… well, he just didn’t understand how anyone could be happy being so isolated.

Shit, even Luther left the house at least _once_ a week.

“It’s not too late to come with us, if you want,” he offered.

“Pass,” Five said tranquilly.

“No, really! I could call right now and book a second room.”

Five looked up over his papers. “A second room,” he repeated. “Meaning that as of right now, you only booked one room?”

“Yeah. They wanted fifty bucks a night for each one, if you can believe that, so I told them we’d just take a double.” Klaus scoffed. “Who pays fifty smackaroos for a bed and a toilet? What am I, the governor?”

“Does Diego know that you’re going to be sharing?”

“Of course.” He paused. “Well, I didn’t explicitly tell him, if that’s what you mean, but it’ll be fine. Slumber party at the beach!”

Five studied him for a long moment.

“Call home when you get there,” he said. “I am _so_ eager to hear how everything goes.”

{}{}{}{}{}

{}{}{}{}{}

The car skidded across two lanes of traffic and collided with the guard rail before erupting into its fiery end.

Grace looked away from the television and jotted down _‘Explosion’_ on her pad of paper.

“Dammit!” one of the characters on screen shouted, punching the roof of their own car. “Dammit, dammit, dammit! Two minutes earlier, and we—“

They broke off into a wordless sob.

Dutifully, she added _‘Dialogue + Crying’_ to the list.

She didn’t understand why Five had wanted her to watch a program with such foul language and write down everything that happened, but he must have had a good reason. Always planning something, her Number Five!

“Are you tired of pit stains?” a disembodied voice demanded.

With an elegant flourish, she added _‘Laundry detergent advertisement.’_

{}{}{}{}{}

The motel Klaus had picked was old and shabby—he called it retro—but the sheets were clean and the air conditioning worked, so Diego didn’t have much to complain about.

Aside from the fact that he was sharing it with Klaus.

“Diego?” a voice whispered into the dark.

The pleasant fog that had been settling over him dissipated.

“What?” Diego mumbled into his pillow.

“Are you awake?”

“Now I am.” He rubbed at an eye. “What’s up?”

Had he had a nightmare? He knew Klaus did, sometimes.

“Oh, nothing. I just wanted to see if you were awake, is all.”

Diego sighed, nestling back down into his cocoon of blankets. “Go to sleep, Klaus.”

There was a rustle of fabric on the other side of the room. “I can’t,” Klaus told him. “I’m too excited. I’m going jet-skiing tomorrow!”

There was a muffled little squeal of glee, followed by what sounded like him thrashing his legs against the sheets in enthusiasm.

Diego closed his eyes tighter. “Great,” he said curtly.

“Isn’t it?” The bedsprings groaned as Klaus shifted. “What are we doing about food, though? I was thinking we’ll go out for breakfast, but maybe we should find a supermarket and get some snacks and stuff to make sandwiches for lunch. Then we can just eat on the beach.”

“Klaus,” said Diego, “I want to go to sleep. Because it’s nighttime. Which is when people do that.”

“We should have brought a cooler,” Klaus mused out loud. “All this ocean air makes me want to chew ice. Hey, do you ever get that? The urge to just, chew a fuckton of ice?”

Diego glared in his general direction. “The only urge I’m getting is to smother you with a pillow.”

“Oh, come on. You’re not still mad that lady asked if we were on our honeymoon, are you?”

“Go. The fuck. To _sleep.”_

“Al- _right,”_ Klaus said, sounding like a kicked puppy. “Jeez. Goodnight.”

Diego yawned. “Goodnight.”

They both fell silent. Water trickled through the inner workings of the air conditioner. There was a faint laugh from somewhere outside.

“Does this place have an ice machine?” Klaus whispered. “I can’t stop thinking about chewing some.”

Diego gritted his teeth. “Keep it up and one of us is spending the night in the car,” he threatened. “And I promise you, it is not going to be me.”

“I was talking to Dave,” Klaus told him sanctimoniously. “I’m sorry that I didn’t know talking to my own boyfriend was in violation of the Geneva Convention.”

Diego’s eyes snapped open. “Dave’s here?”

A shadowy hand raised up from behind the blanket lump on the other bed and waved.

“What the fuck, man?” His voice cracked a little, but only because he was tired. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Sorry,” Dave whispered. “I didn’t have a real body until a minute ago.”

Diego took a breath to steady himself. He wasn’t sure where else he’d expected Dave to be, now that he thought about it, but he _hadn’t_ been thinking about it. Klaus had run out of ghost-conjuring energy hours ago, after he’d tired himself out swimming. ‘Out of sight, out of mind,’ he guessed.

Something moved on the floor, and then Ben’s face was peeking over the edge of the mattress, inches away from Diego’s own.

“I’m here, too,” he whispered. “Goodnight!”

Diego rolled over on his back and stared up at the ceiling.

First thing tomorrow, he was getting his own room.

{}{}{}{}{}

{}{}{}{}{}

Five tucked his water bottle under his arm and tossed Klaus’s—actually Ben’s—library books into the drop-off slot one by one.

A series of essays about tropes in fantasy novels—juvenile.

A true-crime account of a stalking case—schlock.

The biography of a British World War Two spy—pointless, as non-fiction about espionage was, by nature, impossible to fully fact-check.

 _The Mystic’s Guide to Palm Reading_ —Klaus’s.

He let the door swing shut with a sense of satisfaction. There. Errand completed, time outside spent.

Not very pleasant time outside, either. He’d take the bitter cold over this sweaty heat any day. There was always something to light on fire for warmth, but when it was just you and the elements, there was nothing much to do about being too hot, except live with it.

Five turned around, hands in his pockets, and strolled back towards the street. A sudden movement off to his left caught his eye—something shifting by the bushes.

He took a few cautious steps closer. There was a dog lying in the scant shade they provided. Its coat wasn’t quite gray, and it wasn’t quite brown, but it _was_ quite dirty. Each panting breath it took made its tongue flap against the grass.

He couldn’t claim to know much about dogs, but this one looked thirsty.

“Where’s your owner?” he muttered under his breath, scanning the street.

One of the dog’s ears twitched in his direction, and they locked eyes.

…Okay. Fine.

“God, you stink,” he accused as he poured water into his cupped hand. “At least cats clean themselves.”

The dog lapped it up eagerly, oblivious to his complaints.

When the bottle was empty, it licked its lips and made a wheezy horking noise, which was maybe how dogs burped. Five neither knew nor cared.

“That’s it,” he said, straightening up. “No more water. I’m going home, and I’d recommend you find better shade to sleep in.”

He turned on his heel and left. The Brazilian mathematician he corresponded with had sent him some proofs to look over, and he needed to start removing the wood paneling from the walls on the second floor, and… the dog was following him. 

“What are you doing?” he asked it irritably. “Stay here and wait for whoever owns you to come back.” 

The dog plopped down on the sidewalk with a yawn.

Out of the shadows of the bushes, he saw that its collar was old and frayed, and had no tags. Its master was irresponsible to the point of negligence.

Well. At least their dog was obedient enough. Five took a few steps backwards, keeping one wary eye on it, then turned around and hastened up the street.

Not ten paces later his hand brushed something furry. There the thing was again, trotting alongside him like they were old friends out for a walk.

He froze in his tracks. “Go away,” he snapped. “I don’t know you.”

The dog wagged its tail once. He got the irrational sense that it was telling him to calm down.

“I don’t have any more water,” he told it, frustrated. “And I don’t have any food—“ Its ears stood up at attention— “so go bother somebody else.”

They stared at each other.

“Look,” he said, spreading his empty hands. “I don’t have anything to—“

The dog licked his palm, and he lurched away.

Wasn’t that how dogs gave kisses? He knew it was only a dumb animal, but it still seemed shockingly overfamiliar.

“We just met!” he scolded. “Are you always this cheap? _Jesus.”_

A few feet away, a postal worker was emptying a mailbox of its contents. Five had read the phrase ‘the hairy eyeball’ in books, but never before had he understood so clearly what it meant.

Scowling, he looked back to the dog. Its tail wagged expectantly.

…Okay. _Fine._

{}{}{}{}{}

The ocean looked like liquid amber as the sun dipped low over the horizon. A sea breeze blew in, rifling Klaus’s hair, and he took a deep breath of the scent of salt and ozone.

“It’s so beautiful here,” he murmured.

Dave, one arm wrapped tight around his waist, hummed agreeably.

Klaus let his eyes drift closed. The beach was mostly deserted, and the sand was warm underneath him, and it felt, in that moment, as if they were the only two people on earth.

Then something cold and slimy landed in his lap, and he sat up with a jolt.

He looked down. There was a dead fish between his thighs. He looked up. There was Diego, grinning.

“Oh my God!” Ben laughed from over by the water. “You actually fucking did it!”

Klaus turned to Dave with a sweet smile as Diego tore off the down the beach.

“Excuse me for a minute.”

{}{}{}{}{}


	2. July

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More vacations, holiday traditions, new projects and shocking revelations.

Ben’s eyes followed the wave rolling towards him, and he hoisted himself into a crouch on the surfboard.

He nearly lost his balance, feet scrabbling for purchase, but then the wave was underneath him, and—

 _Holy shit,_ he thought, _I’m doing it!_

He tipped sideways and fell off not a moment later, and when he resurfaced, the wave had passed.

Spitting out water and aglow with pride, he climbed back onto the board. It might have taken until their last day in Rhode Island, and his technique might have been clumsy as shit, but for a solid few seconds there, he had been _surfing._

Ben paddled back to shore and ran up the beach, holding his soggy drawers up with one hand. He couldn’t put on a bathing suit, so his only option was to swim in his underwear. Good thing he’d died wearing clean boxers.

“I did it!” he whooped, skittering to a stop in front of Klaus and Diego and Dave. “Did you guys see? I was surfing!”

“What?” Diego was craning his neck around, trying to look at his own back. “No, I—What did this idiot write on me?”

Klaus took a long, smug sip from his juice box. “Nothing.”

Ben leaned over to check what was smeared into Diego’s sunscreen.

“Honk if you like grapes,” he read off. “Did you guys see me surf, though?”

Diego shot Klaus a glare. “The fuck does that even mean?” he demanded.

Klaus shrugged. “It’s pretty self-explanatory.”

“Honk,” Dave agreed.

He was intangible at the moment— the beach was too crowded to risk manifesting a guy with a bleeding chest wound—so Diego just looked on in pissy bewilderment as Klaus snorted juice through his nose.

Ben flopped down onto the sand. They hadn’t seen his moment of glory, but whatever. He had his own life(?) to lead.

Already tuning out the bickering behind him, he drew his knees up to his chest and looked out across the endless glittering expanse of ocean.

The Philippines weren’t as far away as all that.

{}{}{}{}{}

“Vanya, dear! Isn’t this a nice surprise!”

Vanya offered their mother a smile as she stepped back to let her into the house.

“Hey, Mom,” she said. “How are you?”

“Fit as a fiddle!” She closed the door and fussed with the collar of Vanya’s shirt. “Are you here to visit your brothers? They’ll be so pleased to see you—it’s been terribly quiet here with just the three of us.”

“Yeah, I’m sure.” She fidgeted a little. “Do you know where Five is?”

Mom’s gaze turned glassy for a moment as she thought. “I believe he’s in the courtyard.”

Vanya took her time walking through the house. Mom didn’t need to know it, but this wasn’t strictly a social call. And she wasn’t _dreading_ it, exactly, she was just… not in a rush to get started.

As she drew closer to the back door, she heard Five’s voice outside. It sounded homicidal.

There was nothing unusual about that, but what he was saying gave her pause.

“Knock it off!” he commanded. “You’re not—For fuck’s sake, there’s only an inch of water in there, STOP TRYING TO SWIM!”

She pulled the door open, and her mouth parted in surprise.

Five was kneeling in the grass in front of a plastic storage bin, the hose coiled by his feet. And in the bin, there was a dog.

“Five?” she called warily. “What are you doing?”

His head whipped around to face her.

“I’m washing a dog, Vanya, what does it look like?” he snapped.

Well. It _did_ look like he was washing a dog, yes.

She approached with caution. “Where’d it come from?” she asked.

Its graying muzzle dripped with water, reminding her of an old man’s beard, and it leaned forward to snuffle in Five’s ear.

“The library,” he said as he pushed it away in frustration.

Her lips quirked. “I didn’t know they let you check out animals.”

He threw her a look of warning. “It followed me home,” he told her in clipped tones. “Now it won’t leave the front steps because Mom kept putting food out for it—“

The dog whuffed and wagged its tail hopefully.

“—and it smells like rotten coleslaw, so I’m trying to clean it so that I can open the door without gagging.”

“Oh.” Vanya studied it, scratching absent-mindedly at her wrist. “Um. Why don’t you just take it to an animal shelter?”

Five puckered his mouth. “I am _not_ letting this thing get in my car.”

As if on cue, the dog shook itself out, splashing both of them with droplets of dirty water.

Five huffed. “Anyhow. What brought you over today?”

“Oh.” Vanya squeezed her left elbow. “Well… I wanted to talk to you about something, but if this isn’t a good time…”

“It’s as good a time as any,” he said, plucking a thistle from the dog’s fur. “What’s wrong?”

She sat down next to him on the grass. “Nothing,” she assured him. “I’m, um… Katie asked me to be her plus-one for her cousin’s wedding this September.”

“Ah. Well, I can’t help you with that. I’ve never been to a wedding.” He paused. “Get them a toaster.”

“No, that’s not it.” She wrapped her arms around her knees. “It’s just, I’m going to be meeting her whole family. So, I thought… maybe it’s time she meets mine?”

Five gazed at her steadily, waiting for her to continue. The dog did, too.

Vanya curled her toes in her shoes. “I’m… not sure how to bring it up to everybody,” she confessed. “So… do you have any thoughts, or…?”

“Just say that you have a girlfriend and you want them to meet her.” He leaned over to grab a discarded washcloth off the ground. “Simple.”

Well, it was and it wasn’t. She didn’t think that anyone would _disapprove,_ exactly, but…

“I’m not sure how they’ll take it, I guess,” she murmured.

Five sighed through his nose. “Vanya,” he said impatiently, scrubbing shampoo into the dog’s fur, “you do recall that Klaus has a boyfriend living _in_ the house, don’t you? We haven’t burned him at the stake yet, and your situation won’t be any different.”

It was a little different. It had always been fairly obvious that Klaus was… whatever he was. Definitely not straight. Not strictly gay, either.

She didn’t know what to call it. Klaus was an everything bagel.

She, on the other hand, was a bagel that you’d always assumed was the plain kind, but then when you cut it open you discovered it had raisins. And there was nothing wrong with a raisin bagel, but after getting used to thinking that you had a plain one, you might not be in the mood to eat it anymore.

A surprise like that could change the whole dynamic of your breakfast.

The back door creaked open, and Luther stuck his head outside. “Hi, Vanya,” he called. He stepped outdoors with a smile. “Mom said you stopped by to visit.”

Five glanced at her as Luther strolled over to join them. “Here you go,” he said in a low voice. “Tell Luther.”

Vanya clenched her hands together to find that they had suddenly gone sweaty. “Not right now,” she whispered. “I can’t.”

“You can.”

“No!”

“Should I tell him, then?”

Vanya’s heart sped up as Luther got closer. The leaves on the trees started rustling, though there wasn’t any wind.

She gave a small, tentative nod.

“What are you guys whispering about?” Luther asked.

Five sat back on his heels. “Vanya has a girlfriend,” he said. “She wants us to meet her soon.”

Luther froze in his tracks. Blinked a few times.

“Oh.” His gaze slid to Vanya. “Uh. Congratulations?”

She let out a breath. “Thanks.”

The leaves fell silent. The dog sneezed. Five picked up the hose and twisted the nozzle on.

“Is this the woman who spilled her coffee in the van when you borrowed it to pick up your new dresser?” Luther ventured.

“Yeah.” Vanya winced. “That’s her. She’s still sorry about that.”

He shrugged. “It’s okay.”

“Hold still!” Five ordered from behind them.

Vanya looked over to see the dog biting enthusiastically at the spray from the hose while he tried to rinse the soap out of its fur.

“Fucking stop!” he said, sounding deeply vexed. _“That is not how you drink water and you KNOW it.”_

{}{}{}{}{}

{}{}{}{}{}

“—and after that, we were shooting this picnic scene, and it was so hot our makeup kept melting. We’d get halfway through, and then our faces would start dissolving, so they’d stop and reapply it, and then we’d do it over from the top. It ended up taking _four hours._ ”

Diego eased his car a whole foot forward down the freeway, which was more progress than they’d made in the last ten minutes. “Sounds like fun.”

“It wasn’t,” said Allison. “And there were ants everywhere, by the way! When the movie comes out and it gets to that part, please know that there was an ant inside of my underwear.”

Christ, she was _so over_ this freaking movie. Her co-star had fully checked out by day three of filming, and the director seemed to think they were making something revolutionary instead of a paint-by-numbers rom-com. To top it all off, the woman playing the male lead’s evil ex-fiance was a method actress, and getting insulted over the craft services table had stopped being funny weeks ago.

At least she had some time off for the 4th. It was going to be nice—decompress a little with the family, eat cheeseburgers. The only thing that would be better was getting to visit Claire, but Patrick had taken her to his parents’ vacation house in Colorado for the holiday. Allison knew without asking that she wasn’t welcome there.

She brushed her hair off the back of her neck. “So what’s on the agenda for today?” she asked Diego. “Is everybody at the house?”

“Nah.” He slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting a motorcyclist who was lane-splitting their way to Valhalla. “Five and Vanya are out shopping for tomorrow, and Klaus made Luther take the van to help some chick he met in school move apartments. No idea where Ben is.”

Allison twisted around. “Hi, Ben,” she said to the backseat. Just in case.

Diego shot her a dirty look. “Don’t do that.”

She laughed and gave her hair another fluff. “It’s just you and me, then? You feel like getting some lunch?”

His mouth settled into a frown as they rolled forward another few inches. “I should be getting back to the gym, actually. Al threw a fuckin’ fit when I told him I needed to get you from the airport.”

“Oh.” She tilted her head to study his face. “I thought he was pretty lenient about letting you leave work.”

Diego shrugged. “Always used to be,” he said. There was a seed of uncertainty in his voice. “Lately he’s been riding my ass about everything.”

He stared ahead, jaw set grim.

“Might be time to start looking for a new job.”

Oh. That would be a hard thing. The pay wasn’t much, but Allison knew that he liked working at the gym. He’d gotten comfortable there, and Diego never really got comfortable anyplace. Sharp edges and tender feelings didn’t lend themselves to comfort.

“Well,” she said lightly, “if you find yourself with some time off, I know a great place you can spend it.”

He darted a glance at her. “I’m still not going to Florida.”

God, _it wasn’t that bad._ It was hot, but air conditioning was a thing, and there had been plenty of times where she hadn’t felt like getting on a plane and coming to New York. She always did it, anyway.

Why was _she_ always the one making the effort?

“Okay, but did I tell you my house has a hot tub? And the development it’s in has its own fitness center, and there’s a sauna—“

“It _is_ a sauna. The whole fucking state is.”

“—and the management office has vouchers for the golf course up the road—“

“Golf?” he scoffed. “You’re really taking the spaghetti-at-the-wall approach, huh? I don’t _golf.”_

She smiled at him. “Aw, I think you’d look good in the little visor!”

Diego just shook his head.

Allison twisted a ring around her finger. He must really be worried about this business with Al. Usually, he’d either start yelling or laughing after a comment like that, but all he did now was stare off at a fixed point in the distance, something heavy on his mind.

“What the fuck is Big Lou’s?” he asked speculatively.

{}{}{}{}{}

“Where do you think Jillian wants her armchair?” Klaus asked.

He picked his way through the maze of boxes on the floor with one of her curtains tied around his chest like a beauty pageant sash. “Should we put it at the kitchen table? That might be fun, like a bed and breakfast kind of vibe?”

Luther didn’t think she wanted that. Also, her kitchen table was currently disassembled and in the bathtub, so it was kind of a moot point.

“Dude, I think Jill is a hoarder,” Ben called from the kitchen. He pulled a set of salt and pepper shakers shaped like Pikachu out of a box and lined them up next to a pair of windmills. “She has, like, twenty more of these. Is she okay?”

Klaus hefted a plastic box marked ‘plates’ out of the armchair. “She collects them,” he explained. “Let me know if you find the Monopoly piece ones. She said I could borrow them.”

Ben cocked an eyebrow. “Who borrows salt and pepper shakers?”

_“Friends.”_

Luther glanced at him from where he was sweeping up the shards of a vase that had definitely broken during the ride over here, and not because he had squeezed the box it was in too hard.

“Is that why she has so many scented candles?” he asked. “She collects them, too?”

“Nope, that’s our science project!” Klaus set the crate on the floor with a thump. “Every time we hang out, we light ten or twelve candles all at once and see which one has the strongest smell.”

Luther and Ben exchanged a look. It was hard to tell if Klaus was a bad influence on Jillian, or if she’d been this way when he found her.

“We’re looking for the alpha candle,” Klaus informed them.

“…Okay.” Luther dumped the dustpan of glass into a trashbag. “Well, ready to go?”

Jillian was making the final trip from her old apartment to the new one with the last carload of boxes, so as far as he could tell, their job here was done.

“She said we can hang out for a while if we want.” Klaus sat down sideways in the chair and began rifling through a bag of clothing. “Stay for thank-you pizza.”

Luther shifted his weight around. The apartment suddenly felt smaller.

“Well… you can,” he said. “I’m going home. Allison and Diego should be back from the airport by now.”

Klaus flapped his hand. “Oh, you can see them any old time. Stay and do candle science with us! It’s fun until you start getting a headache.”

Ben propped his elbows up on the counter. “I worry about you,” he sighed.

“I don’t really know Jill,” Luther demurred. “I don’t want to, like… overstay my welcome.”

“Ohhh, you can’t, trust me.” Klaus shot him a toothy grin. “She thinks you’re hot.”

Luther was momentarily shocked speechless.

_“…What?”_

“Yep!” Klaus twirled a pair of leggings he had found like a lasso. “She likes guys who are tall and really jacked, and you’re the _most_ jacked.”

Luther stared at him, flabbergasted. “She did not say that.”

“She sure did! She said, ‘Your brother is so hot. I wanna climb him like a tree.’ And then things started getting a little PG-13, so I shut it down.”

“Jillian!” Ben sounded scandalized.

Luther glanced around the room, feeling at sea. It had honestly never occurred to him before that someone might find him attractive. Like, someone who was sober, and aware that he wasn’t wearing a costume. He was… not proportioned the way regular people were, and he knew he could be kind of awkward, and he didn’t have the life experiences that most other adults did. He was pretty much the inverse of ‘the whole package.’

Still. There was someone out there who wanted to climb him like a tree.

Whatever that entailed.

“I could never… _do_ anything, with her,” he said uncomfortably. “She’s so young—I’d feel like a creep.”

Klaus nodded in approval. “Yeah, that’s probably for the best. You guys don’t have much in common. I told her you liked astronomy, and she said that she’s a Pisces.”

“Jillian,” Ben said again. Now he just sounded disappointed.

“Right. Well, I’m going to head back.” Luther paused. “You guys can stay if you want, but Allison’s only in town a few days. She’d probably like it if we were all home for dinner.”

Ben stared at Klaus until he rolled out of the chair with a dramatic sigh.

 _“Fine.”_ He petted the curtain sash he was still wearing. “I’m keeping this, though. If anyone asks, tell them I’m Mr. America and it’s ten bucks for an autograph.”

Outside, Luther paused a moment to take in the sepia tones of the summer evening. The shadows were beginning to lengthen, and he had the passing thought that they were beckoning to him. It was less unnerving than he would have expected.

He’d never date Jillian. But, maybe, he _could_ have a girlfriend, if he looked for one. Friends, if he put in the effort to make them. He could even just… just be out in the world more, try all the things that seemed too intimidating because he’d never done them before.

The only thing stopping him was himself.

He was startled from his musings by the honk of a car horn.

“Let’s get this show on the road!” Klaus yelled out the driver’s side window. “Mr. America waits for no one!”

The horn honked again.

“Alright, I’m coming, calm down,” Luther said, jogging over to the van.

Ben’s head popped out. “Sorry, that was me,” he called. “I just wanted to honk it.”

Luther pulled the door open and slid into the driver’s seat.

“Okay,” he said, hands on the wheel. “Let’s go.”

{}{}{}{}{}

Dave dropped down next to Five at the patio table and watched the dog chase Klaus and Klaus chase Ben and Ben yell that he didn’t want to see the slug, _stop trying to make him look at the slug._

It warmed Dave’s long-dead heart.

“Have you figured out what you’re doing with this dog yet?” he asked Five idly.

Five turned a page in his book. “I’m not doing anything with the dog,” he said. “I’m not accepting any responsibility for the dog. The dog is a free agent.”

“Well, it’s in your yard,” Dave pointed out.

Five frowned at him. “Only for the day. Ben was worried it might run into traffic or something if the fireworks frighten it later. It’s not staying back here.”

Dave watched it break away from Klaus and bark at a squirrel that had gotten too close to the bush it liked to pee on.

“Not sure the dog knows that, man.”

Allison glided over to join them, wearing a red and white checkered sundress that made her look like a very stylish picnic table.

Dave guessed that might have been the point. Modern fashion was a headtrip.

“Hey, guys,” she said, pulling out a chair. “Sunny today, huh?”

“I’m not going to Florida with you,” Five said without looking up from his reading. “Get a goldfish if you want company.”

She turned to Dave with a brilliant smile. “Luther and Diego need a little help with the grill, if you have a minute.”

He gave Five a clap goodbye on the shoulder as he rose from his seat. Or maybe it was a clap good luck. Allison had a magnetic charm, a sharp mind, and a complete inability to take ‘no’ for an answer. _Someone_ was going to Florida, whether they liked it or not.

As he drifted across the yard, Dave mused on what a crazy thing it was that he had come to know these people so well. Fuck, if you’d told him back in 1968 that, someday, he would have in-laws who were aware that he wasn’t just their bachelor brother’s roommate, and who _liked_ him, he would have thought you were going to try and sell him a bridge next.

It was a gift, making a family with Klaus this way.

“—keep opening it, all the heat will escape,” Luther was saying to Diego.

“If nobody opens it, how will we know when it’s ready?” Diego shot back.

…Most of the time it was a gift.

“Hey,” he greeted them. “Grill problems?”

Luther gave Diego a pointed look. “Just one.”

Diego started to bristle like a cornered cat, so Dave stepped in between them to check it out.

“It isn’t getting hot enough?” he guessed, poking around the coals with a metal spatula. “I think it’s because there’s so much charcoal—you just need to give it more time.”

“Oh.” Luther surveyed the grill with dismay. “Well… is there any way to make it go faster?”

“More lighter fluid,” suggested Diego.

“I don’t know about that,” Dave said hastily. “You really only need a bissel to get it started.”

And only a bissel more to burn the backyard down.

Luther turned to where Klaus and Ben were pelting each other with cherries, thoughtful.

“Do you think the ghost who helped us last year is around?”

Dave shrugged and put the spatula down. “Haven’t seen him.”

Hadn’t seen him in quite a while, actually, which was odd. The guy was usually right there and ready to mix in.

“Klaus,” Diego yelled across the yard. “Klaus, where’s the barbeque ghost? Get him back here.”

Klaus whipped one final cherry at Ben. “What? Who’s the barbeque ghost?”

“His name is Scooter,” Five chimed in from the table.

“Oh, that guy.” Klaus rubbed one of his shoulders. It was too far to see his face well, but Dave thought he was frowning. “I don’t know where he is. He’s forsaken us and our cookout this year, I guess.”

“Can’t you conjure him?” asked Luther.

Even at this distance, Dave knew Klaus was rolling his eyes.

“Sure, I can take a whack at it.”

He did a few squats to limber up, then tipped his head back and shouted “SCOOOOOTERRRRRR!” at the sky so loud the dog ran and hid under Five’s chair.

Dave smiled. It was hard to believe, sometimes, that this was all his.

“Oh, look!” Klaus exclaimed, pointing at a cloud. “Here he comes!”

Allison shaded her eyes with one hand and looked up. “Seriously?” she asked. _“That’s_ how you conjure ghosts?”

“Pfft, _no.”_

Ben threw a cherry at her.

The back door opened and Vanya stepped outside with a plastic food container in both hands.

“Hi, everybody,” she called as she made her way down the steps. “Sorry I’m late. I, uh. I had to stop by at a friend’s thing.”

Over at the table, Five shook his head.

“Don’t worry about it,” Luther said, prodding moodily at the coals. “There’s no food yet.”

“If you keep opening the grill,” Diego told him with obvious relish, “all the heat will escape.”

Dave cleared his throat. “What’s that you’ve got, Vanya?”

She pulled the lid off as she padded towards them through the grass. “Potato salad,” she said, holding it out for his inspection. She shot a wry smile at Diego. “I figured I’d leave the macaroni to you this year.”

Diego stared down at the container with something that was just shy of a pout.

 _“I_ made potato salad,” he said.

“So did Mom,” Luther told them, and then a cherry bounced off his chest.

Vanya got up on her tiptoes to examine the grill. “Is it… working?” she asked tentatively. “Why isn’t it getting hot?”

Diego crossed his arms. “Because someone put in too much charcoal.”

 _“You_ put in the charcoal,” Luther protested.

“And? I’m someone.”

Vanya tapped her thumbs on the side of the container. “What if you added more lighter fluid?”

“There’s already plenty lighter fluid,” Dave said. He tried to inject a note of authority into his voice, because Luther was eyeing the bottle like it was about to be his next bad decision. “We definitely don’t need more.”

“Oh, okay.” Vanya shrugged. “I just thought maybe that would speed things up.”

Dave smiled at her, and gently took the potato salad from her hands. “Let’s go see what Five and Allison are up to.”

To the surprise of no one, they were having a disagreement.

“—that if I ever got a dog, I would name it Trixie,” Allison was telling a pinch-faced Five. “That’s such a cute dog name, don’t you think? Trixie.”

“I am not naming this fucking dog,” he said through his teeth.

“You don’t have to, I just did.” She held out her hands and cooed, “Trix- _ie!_ Come here, girl!”

The dog flopped over onto its side.

“We don’t even know if it’s male or female,” Five snapped at her. “And stop talking to it, it’s going to think that we like it.”

Klaus jogged over, panting, and looped his arms around Dave’s neck for a sweaty kiss.

“It’s a girl,” he announced, snatching a slice of watermelon. “Well, either that or somebody went way overboard while they were neutering him. Ooh, more potato salad!”

Ben, who had been approaching the table, froze in his tracks. “If you throw that at me,” he warned, watching Klaus smear creamy potato chunks across his watermelon, “then we’re fighting for real.”

Allison laughed. “I do like her!” she told Five. “She’s cute, and I don’t have to clean up after her. Best dog ever.”

Vanya was leaning back in her chair to look under the table. “Yeah,” she agreed. “She looks a lot better since you gave her a bath.”

Allison straightened up with a gasp. “Aww!”

“Where was I?” demanded Ben. He looked very put out. “Can we give her another bath?”

Five sat back in his chair, fuming. “I’m going to put up fliers,” he said darkly.

Vanya plucked a cherry from the bowl and bit into it. “Want some help? I can go with you.”

“And forsake your students?” asked Klaus. He tilted his head to Dave with a frown. “Wow, _lot_ of forsaking going on today, huh? Next you’ll be telling me you want a divorce.”

Dave smiled and kissed his forehead. “Never,” he said, and he loved the way Klaus melted into him at the word.

“Guys, stop,” Ben pleaded from behind them. “People are eating.”

Vanya spit the cherry pit into a napkin. “Everything is on hold because of the holiday,” she said. “People are traveling and stuff. So, I’m free all week.”

Allison turned to her with all the focus of a satellite picking up a signal.

“She done fucked up now,” Klaus whispered gleefully in Dave’s ear.

“You’re free all week?” Allison repeated.

“I…” Vanya trailed off, her eyes widening as she realized the mistake she had just made. She looked to Five for help, but she was beyond that, now. There _was_ no help where she was going.

“You can come to Florida with me!” Allison clapped her hands once in excitement. “I fly back Monday, but if I call today I bet I can still get you a seat on my flight.”

Her eyes shined with hope, and slowly, surely, Vanya wilted like a dying flower.

“…Okay,” she agreed miserably. “I can go, I guess. For a few days.”

Allison bounced out of her chair, beaming. “I’ll go book your ticket right now! Oh my gosh, we’re going to have the best time!”

Once the screen door had banged shut behind her, Five turned to Vanya.

“That was pathetic,” he informed her.

“Total tragedy,” Klaus agreed around a mouthful of watermelon and potatoes. “And yet, I still laugh.”

Dave nudged her shoulder. “It’s nice of you to go keep her company,” he said. “And Florida’s a beautiful place, really.” He paused. “Gonna be awful hot, though.”

Vanya heaved a sigh.

The grass crunched, and Dave turned to find Luther drawing up to the table. He had rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. Dave leaned down to give Klaus another kiss to stop himself staring.

“Is there food yet?” asked Five. The dog raised her head off the ground.

“No.” Luther glanced over his shoulder at Diego, who was squinting skyward like he was expecting something to happen. “I just… wanted to be over here for a minute.”

“The grill _still_ isn’t ready?”

“Why don’t you try adding more lighter fluid?” Ben suggested.

“No, don’t do that,” said Dave. “Once the coals are lit, it can cause a flare, so it’s really not safe to—“

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a knife spiral through the air from above, turning handle-over-blade as it hurtled towards earth.

Diego stretched out an arm and caught it between two fingers.

“See!” he crowed in triumph at Luther. “I told you I could do it!”

Dave’s heart sank as Klaus applauded. Sometimes, he wondered how six of the seven of them had managed to make it to adulthood, because not a single one of them had an appropriate sense of danger.

He was fighting a losing battle here, wasn’t he?

The back door creaked open again, and Allison flounced outside in her swooshy sundress.

“Done!” she called to Vanya. “Our flight’s at ten on Monday. I couldn’t get seats next to each other, but we can just ask someone to trade once we’re on the plane.”

Luther raised his eyebrows. “You’re going to Florida?”

“Yep!” Allison did a twirl as she sat back in her seat. “It’s going to be so much fun!”

“Can’t wait,” Vanya said weakly.

Luther nodded, deep in thought. He looked, for a second, like he was about to say something, but his great revelation was interrupted by Five.

“When can we eat?” he asked. “You’ve been fucking with the grill all morning, and I’m starving.”

“Oh, is it still not hot enough?” Allison smoothed out the skirt of her dress. “Maybe it needs more lighter fluid.”

 _“No,”_ Dave insisted.

“You need to be careful with accelerants,” agreed Five.

Dave sighed in relief. Of course Five would know a thing or two about fire safety. He couldn’t have lasted thirty years in the wild if he’d been spraying gasoline around willy-nilly.

Five stood up. “So I’ll do it,” he concluded. “Where’s the bottle?”

Klaus glanced at Dave. “I don’t know, guys,” he said, uncertain. “Maybe… maybe this time, arson _isn’t_ the answer.”

Dave’s mouth parted in surprise. He knew Klaus loved him, but more than he loved setting shit on fire?

Holy fuck. If he was still alive, this would’ve been the perfect moment to propose.

“Yeah,” said Vanya. She was watching Five with her brow furrowed. “What if you can’t jump away fast enough?”

His nostrils flared. “Excuse me?”

“I…” She hunched her shoulders. “I just don’t think it’s worth it to risk burning your face off for a chicken wing,” she said in a meek voice.

“Three for three!” Diego called from over by the grill. He brandished the knife at Luther. “You owe me a dollar.”

“Are you bleeding?” Allison yelled back, leaning around Vanya to see him. “What happened?”

“Cut my thumb a little. Still counts, though.”

“I could do it,” Ben was saying to Five. “I can’t get burned—it doesn’t even hurt if I touch the oven rack.”

Five tilted his head like he was debating it.

“Guys,” Dave said, with as much kindness as he could muster, “if we’re trying to figure out who’s the least likely to incinerate themselves when they add lighter fluid to the grill, maybe that’s a sign that _we shouldn’t add lighter fluid to the grill.”_

“Well… everybody’s hungry, though,” Luther pointed out.

Dave looked to Vanya. Vanya was level-headed. Vanya could be reasoned with. Vanya was the most down-to-earth person in the family by a mile, and she now held the fate of their barbeque in her teeny tiny little hands.

She squirmed. “I, um. I don’t really know anything about grilling? So, whatever you guys think is best, I guess.”

Of course, Vanya was also a pushover.

Dave watched with a grimace as Ben approached the grill and shooed Diego back a few feet. Klaus moved to join them, but he hooked a finger through the belt loop on his pants and pulled him closer.

“Stay back here,” he said firmly.

“Sir, yes, sir,” Klaus said, grinning.

Ben squirted the lighter fluid. The flames licked high, and then higher, and then… died back down.

“Well, that was anti-climactic,” Klaus commented.

“I’m good with that,” Dave said on a sigh of relief.

“Wait!” Ben picked up the barbeque tongs and dug through the coals.

“The vent at the bottom is closed!” he laughed, reaching for the handle to open it. _“That’s_ why it wasn’t getting hot, it needs more oxyg—“

“Ooh!” Klaus clapped in appreciation as the fire flared above Ben’s head. “Something bad is happening and I had nothing to do with it!”

Ben watched the blaze for a long moment, then turned around.

“Guys,” he called. “Guys, I think we fucked up.”

“Do you mean ‘we’ or do you mean ‘you?’” Diego asked.

“We,” Ben said stubbornly. “This was a group effort fuck-up and you know it.”

Five shoved his hands in his pockets. “Well, guess I’m getting the fire extinguisher,” he said, without much concern.

“Oh. We, uh. We don’t have one anymore,” Luther told him, eyes glued to the flames like all his hopes and dreams were going up in smoke along with the charcoal. “The tag said it expired in 1996. So I threw it away.”

Five rocked back on his heels. “Well, guess I’m calling the fire department.”

Allison popped a cherry into her mouth, looking thoughtful. “What if we just like, put a hot dog on a skewer and held it in the fire?” she suggested. “Do you think that would work?”

Vanya scrunched up her face at her.

“The Girl Scouts do it,” Allison insisted.

Klaus rested his head on Dave’s shoulder with a dreamy sigh to watch the inferno. “This is my new favorite holiday,” he said, starry-eyed.

Dave rubbed a hand up and down his back. He hadn’t thought this 4th of July could possibly be more eventful than the last one, and yet, here they were. But everyone was still alive—at least, everyone who had started out the day that way—and no one was injured or in tears, and Klaus was having a good time.

That was about as much as you hope for with this family. His family. And maybe he was nuts, but Dave loved them for it.

Still. 

He wouldn’t complain if the old guy came back to run things next year.

{}{}{}{}{}

Late that night, with the smell of burning sage tickling his nostrils, Klaus closed his eyes and took in a slow, deep breath.

He had never quite gotten the whole ghost-conjuring thing down, but he figured it was probably time to give it a shot.

First, he needed to clear his mind. That much he knew. He created a mental image of a plain white wall and focused.

Just a blank wall. Nothing on it. Emptiness. Tedium. A shadow puppet of a bunny. _No!_

Klaus shook his head in frustration and tried again.

Not a blank wall, this time, just… relaxing in the bath. Warm water loosening up his muscles. Weightlessness. A bead from the pillow he was sitting on digging into his butt.

With a huff, he reached down and pulled the pillow out, then tossed it across his bedroom. God, he really needed to stop going for style over comfort. Pants that pinched his nuts and shoes that gave him blisters were getting old.

Ugh, but who was he kidding? Nobody looked this good without a little suffering.

And actually, now that he thought about it, he still needed to find his green sneakers, he hadn’t seen them since—

Klaus plopped back down on the floor and sulked. There he went getting distracted again.

Alright. Alright. Clear his mind. Think about… watching the weather report.

Wind chill factor. Humidity percentage. Stultifying boredom. What was a low pressure system? Klaus didn’t know. Dave’s arm around him. Both of them melting into the sofa. Rain beating against the window…

“Klaus?”

He opened bleary eyes and immediately cracked his head against something hard and wooden.

Ben stooped down to look at him. “Why are you sleeping on the floor, dude?”

“Sleeping?” Klaus tried to sit up and hit his head a second time. When his eyes could focus again, he found himself looking at a lollipop he’d stuck to the underside of his mattress when he was ten. “Is it morning already?”

“Almost 8:30,” Ben confirmed.

Klaus rubbed his forehead and sighed.

He wasn’t sure if Dave or Ben had noticed yet, but there had been no sign of Corpse-odile Dundee for more than a month. And he really, desperately needed to conjure him, because if the nosy old shit had gone to his eternal rest without giving anybody a heads’ up, they were going to have _words._

It was like packing up all your stuff and moving to Canada while your roommate was at work. Who the fuck did that?

Ben was giving him a funny look. “Are you alright?”

Klaus beamed at him. “Superlative in every way!”

He pretended to make a snow angel on the floor. Ben didn’t laugh, but at least he stopped asking questions.

“Yeah, okay,” he said. “Anyway, can you manifest me? Five put the dog back out on the front steps, so I need to go get her and then drop an ice cube down the back of his shirt.”

Klaus leaned over and wrapped a glowing blue hand around Ben’s ankle. “Have fun!”

Once Ben had left, he ripped his antique lollipop free and sucked on it dolefully.

How on earth were you supposed to clear your mind without a little bit of weed, at the very least?

Inner peace was a fucking racket.

{}{}{}{}{}

Vanya had been in Florida for less than two hours, but she had already come to three major realizations.

First, she was going to need to buy a pair of sandals while she was here. She had never owned a pair of sandals before, because she wasn’t the kind of brazen fashion plate who went around outdoors with their toes exposed, but her feet were getting slippery inside of her sneakers.

Second, Allison had not been overselling her rental place. The development it was set in was a winding labyrinth of white stucco houses, each with their own privacy gate, and the streets were lined with palm trees and orange hibiscus bushes. The beds were king-sized. The terrace was sunken. Every room had high ceilings, and the pool was completely unnecessary because she could have gone swimming in the bathtub.

Her third realization had been a hard one, because she loved Allison. Loved spending time with her. There was no one else in the whole world she’d rather have as a sister.

But she could never, ever live with her again in life.

Allison flung open her front door and dumped her travel bag on the floor in the front hallway.

“Home again, home again, jiggety-jig,” she announced.

Vanya glanced at her from where she was propping her violin case against the wall. “Uh… what?”

“Oh, it’s a nursery rhyme.” Allison waved a hand as she kicked off her shoes. “You have a kid and then you start saying dumb stuff like that, I don’t know.”

She reached over to flick a switch on. “Let there be light!”

Vanya frowned at her back as she led her to the bedrooms.

“So this is the best one,” she said, opening the door. “It’s got a view of the backyard, see? You can stay in whatever one you want, but I’d pick this one if I was you.”

Vanya studied the dress thrown over the back of a chair and the pile of clothes on the bed and the shoes that were inexplicably on top of the nightstand.

“Was someone else visiting you?”

“No, I’ve just been using this as my closet,” Allison explained. She retrieved a bra from the inside door handle. “The one in my room is too small to fit two whole months’ worth of outfits, but I can move all this stuff somewhere else.”

Well… alright. Vanya’s closet at home was small and she managed to fit a whole life’s worth of outfits in it just fine, but she supposed Allison’s standards were different.

Across the hall was the bathroom, which could have fit three of Vanya’s bathroom inside of it and still have space left over for the towel warmer.

“There’s one off the master bedroom, too, so this one is all yours.” Allison scooped an armful of her makeup off the counter. “This one has better lighting so I was putting my face on in here, but the _best_ lighting is actually in the sunroom.”

There was a hair dryer sitting in the sink. Vanya yanked the power cord from the wall outlet. It felt like pulling the plug on a bathtub full of anxiety.

“This is my favorite place in the whole house,” Allison told her, opening the sunroom door with her knee. “Isn’t it pretty?”

It was gorgeous. It was all windows, one of them open to let the breeze in through the screen, with a plush sofa and a small glass-top table in the middle. How nice would it be to have breakfast in here and watch the sun rise?

Then Allison dumped all her makeup on the table, and just like that, it turned into her vanity.

Vanya gazed out the open window.

…She probably should have closed that before leaving town.

“This is where I do my yoga before I head over to the set for the day,” Alison said, arranging her lipstick in a row. “Hey, did you pack the mat I gave you?”

Vanya shifted her weight to her other leg. “Oh, um. No. There wasn’t really space in my bag.”

Also she didn’t know where it was. Allison had brought it over this past spring, telling her that yoga was so relaxing and she bet it would help with controlling her powers and they should take a class together, and then Vanya had stowed it in a closet somewhere ten minutes after she’d left.

Putting on a pair of stretch pants and silently twisting herself into weird shapes on the floor did not sound at all like a good use of her time.

“Oh, that’s fine, we can share,” Allison assured her. She twirled a tube of mascara through her fingers. “I’ve been wanting to try some of the two-person poses, but it’s so awkward going to a studio and putting your feet all over strangers.”

“Great,” Vanya said reluctantly.

One of them was going to wind up with a broken neck.

The kitchen kind of had that farmhouse style going on—lots of natural light and pale wood—and it also smelled awful.

“Ooh, I forgot to take the trash out before I flew east,” Allison said as she peered down into the bin. _“Wow_ that stinks.”

“What day do they pick it up?” asked Vanya, trying not to breathe through her nose.

“You know, I’m not sure?” Allison pulled the bag out and double knotted it, then laughed. “I’m not used to thinking about stuff like that! Life is hard without a housekeeper.”

Vanya offered her a wan smile as she pulled the back door open and tossed the garbage outside.

“Is that why you wanted someone to come stay with you?”

“Psh, no.” Allison made a mock-serious face at her. “Living alone is going amazing. I’ll have you know that I recently did my own laundry for the first time in like, eight years, and I can now cook rice that’s _this_ close to tasting good.”

Vanya’s smile got bigger. “Did you make it in the microwave?”

“Hell yes I did.”

Vanya huffed out a laugh, though she had to wonder how Allison had managed on her own before she was famous. She was picturing a studio apartment that was just a pit of sadness and unwashed dishes. And shoes on tables.

It was odd, thinking of glamorous, confident Allison needing someone to take care of her. It was equally odd to think of her being lonely. Vanya was very glad that she had decided to come here, all of a sudden.

“While we’re on the subject, are you hungry?” Allison opened her fridge and took out two bottles of water. “Lunchtime, munchtime!”

Oh, God. That one Vanya had heard her say before. There was a little song that went along with it, which Claire probably loved, but Claire was also five years old.

“Yeah,” Vanya said, before she could launch into it. “I could eat.”

“Great!” Allison threw her one of the water bottles. “Grilled cheese? How does that sound?”

“Sure.”

Allison took out a block of cheese and then just stood there with it.

Vanya took a sip of water.

Allison smiled at her.

Vanya fiddled with the bottle cap.

“I’d make them myself,” Allison said, “but I’d have to use the microwave for that, too.”

Vanya wordlessly held out her hand for the cheese. _So_ glad she’d decided to come here.

{}{}{}{}{}

{}{}{}{}{}

“This is not a game,” Five said sternly. “If you don’t want my help, that’s your choice, but you need to at least try to understand the gravity of your situation.”

Like the fool it was, the dog wagged its tail and continued trying to play tug of war with the rope he’d tied around its collar.

Five sighed. All he needed was to take one decent picture of the thing to put on a poster, but nothing was ever that easy. First it wouldn’t come out of the shade, and then it needed to investigate the camera, and now it apparently thought it was too good for a leash.

This loser was working his last fucking nerve.

The dog pulled hard at the rope and finally succeeded in ripping it from his hand.

“Hey!” he called as it frolicked across the yard. “Come back here!”

It stopped to sniff at a tomato that had fallen off the vine, then tore off after a butterfly.

“Dog! Come here!”

After barking once, it started spinning in a circle for no goddamn reason.

Five glared at it. Did it not know any commands? Was it brain-damaged? Ignoring him?

The dog caught its tail between its teeth and looked at him like he was supposed to be impressed.

Brain-damaged, then.

There was one thing that it did know, though, and he supposed he could use it to his advantage.

“FOOD!”

Instantly, the dog released its tail and raced over to him. It sat down on the grass in front of him, panting and expectant.

“There’s no food, you moron,” he chided as he picked up the rope. “Wouldn’t you have smelled it already? Use your brain.”

The dog lunged to bite its makeshift leash again, but Five cut it off with a sharp _“No.”_

“Listen,” he said. “It’s clear you like your independence. I’m the same. But there’s a limit. You need to make compromises sometimes, because no one wants to be so independent that they find themselves alone. I had to learn that the hard way.”

It didn’t understand him, of course, but he thought there was a light in its eyes that made it look a bit less stupid than usual. It allowed him to lead it to a sunny spot with no further argument.

“Alright,” he said, picking up the camera. Then, because there was nobody else around to hear it, he added, “Say cheese.”

The dog’s ears pricked up at the flash, but it remained seated. Like it knew that’s what he wanted it to do.

“Good dog.” He waved a dismissive hand at it, trying to ignore the way its tail wagged. “Feel free to go about your day.”

The back door opened, and Mom stepped outside.

“Five, dear,” she called in the voice she used to scold them. “I would be happy to fix you something to eat, but you mustn’t shout ‘Food’ to ask for it. You have better manners than that, my darling.”

{}{}{}{}{}

It felt strange to be trying to conjure a ghost while the sun was still out—it always just seemed like something you did under the cover of darkness—but Klaus had a small window of free time while Dave was holding Ben hostage at a Mets game, and he guessed he should make the most of it.

It was a little easier to clear his mind, today. He’d been working on that quite a bit, and while he didn’t seem any closer to finding the old man for it, it was nice to just… not think about anything for a minute.

He imagined he was sitting in a field full of flowers. He tried to remember what marigolds looked like and couldn’t, so he just went for dandelions. Nature’s clutter.

So there he was, surrounded by a sea of yellow garbage. There was a warm breeze. The sky was cloudless. There was a hill ahead of him, a gentle swell in the earth, and coming over it, he saw… he saw…

“Hey, Klaus, do you want to go out for dinner tonight?” Luther’s voice butted in.

He opened his eyes and kicked the floor in frustration. “Can you _knock?”_ he demanded.

Luther looked taken aback. “I… Why would I knock before I go into the living room?”

Well. He wouldn’t, Klaus supposed.

He’d let it slide.

This time.

“I just wanted to know if you felt like going out for dinner,” Luther repeated.

“Ooh, a date?” Klaus winked at him. “You should know that I don’t put out for anything less expensive than _offres de poulet.”_

“I don’t know what that is,” Luther said politely. “I just thought maybe we could drive around the neighborhood and find a place that looked good? Somewhere we’ve never ordered from or anything.”

Klaus raised his eyebrows. “Sounds adventurous,” he said. “You sure you’re up for all that spontaneity? I don’t want you to break out in hives.”

Luther just looked at him, puzzled.

“Because you’re allergic to fun?” Klaus prompted. He crossed his arms. “God, you could make it a little easier to be mean to you, you know. Work with me here.”

Luther rolled his shoulders with a hint of embarrassment. “I’m trying to… I don’t know. Do more stuff? I _want_ to be spontaneous.”

Oh. Well, now Klaus felt kind of bad for teasing him, because that was a pretty big deal. Go Luther go.

He sat back on his heels. “Okay, sure,” he said. “Is it just going to be us?”

“Maybe. Diego said he can’t come because he ate too much junky stuff while you guys were on vacation, and Five’s working on something in his room.” Luther’s eyes took on a haunted cast. “I’m not asking him until he comes out.”

Good call. You took your life in your hands if you interrupted Math Time.

“One-on-one bonding trip!” Klaus exclaimed. “I love it! Hey, you wanna do a dine and dash?”

“What?” Luther took a horrified half-step backwards. “No, of course not.”

Then, suspiciously, “Have you done that before?”

Klaus wriggled his shoulders. “What do _you_ think?”

Oh, the look on his face! He wished he had a camera.

{}{}{}{}{}

Allison climbed barefoot and a little uncoordinated out of the cab into the heat of the night. The street was silent save for the soft rustling of the palmettos in the breeze, and she had the fleeting sensation that she was floating in a sweet dream.

The alcohol probably helped.

She turned to Vanya, who was standing there with one of the strappy shoes she’d discarded in either hand. Good thing she was looking out—Allison had nearly forgotten them in the cab.

“Wanna go sit in the pool and get hammered?”

Vanya flashed her a loopy smile. “We’re already hammered.”

“We’re not!” Allison padded over to the gate of her rental house and punched in the key code. “We’re loosey-goosey. It’s different.”

The gate didn’t open. Huh.

“You tried to light a cigarette backwards,” Vanya said, drawing up next to her.

Allison blew a raspberry as she tried the code again. “Oh, you know me, I’m directionally challenged. Hey, this thing is 2-4-4 to get in, right?”

“Uh-huh. It won’t work?”

“No.” She tried a third time, without success. “Ooh. I probably should have asked what to do if this happens. Guess we’re climbing!”

Vanya was squinting at something in the driveway. “Allison,” she said slowly, “whose car is that?”

There was a red convertible in front of the garage. With… Wisconsin plates?

After a few seconds, Allison clapped her hands together. “So!” she said brightly. _“That_ probably belongs to the person who lives here, because this is not my house.”

A reluctant smile tugged at Vanya’s lips. “Loosey-goosey.”

With a laugh, Allison spun on her heel to lead her up the street. The world spun with her.

No more spinning, she decided. Done with the spinning.

“It’s not my fault!” she protested. “All these houses look exactly the same!”

“What’s your address again?” asked Vanya, trotting along behind her.

“Oh, I forgot five seconds after the realtor handed me the keys, that’s why I was just telling the cab driver where to turn.”

She stopped at a place that looked familiar. _All_ the places looked familiar, but this one was maybe a little more familiar.

“I think this is it,” she said.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. No. Maybe.” She peered through the bars of the gate. “No, false alarm. I like their curtains, though.”

Vanya shuffled closer to see. “Yeah, those are nice,” she agreed. “I wish I was good at decorating.”

She looked so dejected, like a Victorian orphan begging for bread crusts at the steps of a mansion, and Allison reflected on what a shame it was that they’d missed out on so many years of getting trashed together because it was sort of hilarious.

“I can help you when I’m done with this stupid movie,” she offered. “I love buying house stuff. I love buying house stuff so much I almost want to buy another house to put it all in.”

Vanya nodded in understanding, and Allison’s heart swelled. Vanya just really _got_ her, you know?

“You know what we should do?” she said as they continued down the street. “We should get matching jewelry.”

Their shoulders bumped together as Vanya fell into step beside her, and she had to hop on one foot for a second to regain her balance. Vanya tried to grab her wrist to steady her, and missed by a wide mark.

…Okay, _maybe_ they were a little bit past loosey-goosey.

“Like friendship bracelets, you mean?” Vanya asked once they were both back on solid footing.

“Yeah!” said Allison. “But, you know, nice ones. Whatever the grown-up version of a friendship bracelet is, that’s what we should get.”

Vanya paused to mull it over under a streetlight. She looked good, Allison realized. Healthy, like she’d gotten some sun. She looked _pretty._ To think—her own sister, who she’d known her entire life, and not until now she ever realized that she was pretty.

God, she was just the worst, wasn’t she? How could anyone be so self-absorbed, so superficial, so—

“Maybe tomorrow we can get bracelets,” said Vanya. “Tonight we should get pizza.”

Allison bounced on her bare toes in excitement. “The realtor left me take-out menus!”

“Cool.” Vanya smiled, swaying a little. “Can we get half buffalo chicken? That’s my favorite.”

Goosebumps prickled up and down Allison’s arms.

“It’s my favorite, too,” she whispered in awe. “Nobody ever wants to get it with me. Everyone says it’s not real pizza.”

Vanya waved one of Allison’s glitzy shoes through the air. “I don’t care what it is,” she said. “I love it.”

It was probably the alcohol working its magic again, but Allison felt a wave of affection surging in her chest, and decided to let it sweep her away.

She stumbled forward to give Vanya a hug that nearly bowled them both over.

“I’m so glad you came to Florida,” she said. “I’m so glad that you’re here, and that we both like buffalo chicken pizza, and that we’re getting matching bracelets tomorrow, and I think we should go with rose gold and opal because opal is our birthstone, and—“

“Are you crying?” Vanya asked in alarm. “Why are you crying? What’s wrong?”

Allison pulled back with a sniffle. “Sorry,” she said in a thick voice. “It’s not sad crying. I think I’m supposed to be one of those people who just cries about everything, but I only let it happen when I’m drinking.”

“Oh.” Vanya relaxed. “Okay.” A pause. “I’m… probably not going to wear a bracelet, though.”

Allison wiped at her eyes. “Yeah, I know. But at least we’ll both have them.”

“Cool.”

Vanya smiled at her for a moment. Glassy-eyed, but genuine—her sister, and her friend. Allison returned it in kind, hoping she could see how happy she was that they could have a night to be drunk and stupid and over-emotional together, stumbling around and talking too loud and making a million plans they wouldn’t remember in the morning. Hoping she could see that she wanted a thousand more nights, just like this one.

Vanya squirmed a little bit. “Let’s keep looking for your house. I need to pee.”

“Oh, me too!” Allison said, elated.

_Yay sisters!_

{}{}{}{}{}

Luther cut the ignition to the van and stepped out into the driveway. Another Space Day down.

Dave and Ben were strolling up the street to the house, which was strange, because Klaus wasn’t with them and Dave was _never_ visible in public, but Luther started to raise a hand in greeting anyway.

And then Ben jogged up the front steps to slam face-first into the door.

“What the fuck!” he yelped, stumbling backwards. He rubbed his nose. “Dude, are we real right now?”

“Yes,” Luther told them from the sidewalk.

“Oh, shit.” Dave brought a hand up to the hole in his chest. “I guess that lady really _was_ staring at us.”

Ben stepped backwards to look up at the second story of the house. “What is he doing up there?” he muttered to himself.

It was a fair question. For a short time last fall, Klaus had experimented with how far he could travel from the family ghosts while allowing them to remain tangible. The answer had been _‘not very.’_

What had changed, Luther wondered? Was he actually trying to develop his powers? That didn’t sound like the Klaus he knew.

“How was your thing?” Dave asked as Luther let them into the house.

“Pretty good.” He pushed the door open and paused, frowning. “They ask the kids what their favorite part was at the end of each week, though, and I keep coming in second to the Earth Sciences guy. He does a baking soda volcano with them.”

It was giving him a whole new level of appreciation for the frustration Diego must have felt for most of their childhood, to be honest. How was he supposed to compete with that? The deck was stacked against him from the start.

 _“I’d_ rather learn about space than volcanoes,” Ben told him.

Luther shot him a smile. “Thanks.”

Inside, Dave headed upstairs to check on Klaus, and Ben lingered in the hallway as Luther sorted through their mail.

“So, what are you doing now?” he asked. “Any plans for the rest of the day?”

“I don’t know yet. Maybe I’ll take a nap.”

He set aside a small package addressed to Five. His math penpal sent him trinkets from Brazil sometimes, and Vanya had told him once that it would be polite to send something back.

He had settled on a pair of waterproof socks. Apparently, the professor was an avid hiker. Nobody had ever pushed the issue again.

“Oh, okay.” Ben played with his zipper. “Dave and I went to the movies. There’s this place that plays older stuff during the day—he wanted to show me _The Wizard of Oz.”_

“Cool,” Luther said absently. Mom had gotten another one of her housekeeping magazines. It said it was the summer craft edition. Not for the first time, he wondered if the subscribers ever actually did any of these projects, or if it was all aspirational.

“Yeah, it was pretty good. Dave is like, in love with the actress from it or something, though, so that was sort of weird.” Ben leaned against the wall. “There was one of those escape room places next door to the theater.”

Luther tore open a letter from the gas company. “A what?”

“An escape room,” Ben said again. “It’s this thing where they lock you in, and there’s clues and puzzles and things you have to solve to get out.”

Luther frowned at him. “How is that legal?”

Ben shrugged. “It’s a game.”

So was hunting human beings for sport, but Luther didn’t want to play that, either.

“It looked sort of cool,” Ben went on. His tone was nonchalant, but he was watching Luther’s face with barely suppressed eagerness. “They had a New Orleans themed one, and one where you have to break out of the Temple of Doom.”

They looked at each other.

“The sign said it’s best if you have four people,” he said hopefully.

“Well, Ben—“ Luther gestured with the letter in his hand. “I don’t know. I’m not sure anybody would want to do that.”

It sounded like a training exercise their father would have come up with. Except in any temple _he’d_ designed, the mummies would be real, and the snakes would be venomous.

“I bet I could talk Five into it,” Ben insisted. “He loves puzzles and all that kind of stuff.”

“You think so?” Luther asked skeptically.

“Yeah, for sure. And Klaus will be in, too. I’ll just tell him he can wear a costume, he’ll love it.”

“I…”

 _Be more spontaneous,_ he reminded himself. _Say yes to things._

“Okay,” he agreed, already regretting it. “If you can get four of us to go, I’ll do it.”

“I’ll go ask Klaus right now,” Ben said in excitement, already running for the stairs.

Luther let the gas bill slip from his hand with a sigh.

Being fun was a lot more work than it looked like.

{}{}{}{}{}

Vanya heaved her bag out of the luggage carousel and adjusted her violin over her shoulder to balance the extra weight.

Her flight had actually arrived back in NYC a little ahead of schedule, so she thought she might buy herself a snack and find somewhere to sit down and wait for Five—but he was already there, standing in front of a kiosk selling headphones with his arms crossed.

“Hey!” She skirted around a group of 60-somethings all wearing matching T-shirts and hats. “Five! I’m here!”

Gosh, it was good to see him. If he’d been anyone else, she would have pulled him into a hug, but he found public displays of affection performative. And private displays of affection, too.

“Vanya.” He gave her an assessing glance up and down. “Are you alright?”

…Did he mean _‘How are you?’_

Vanya frowned. He had left the house at _all_ while she’d been gone?

“Yeah,” she said. “I’m fine. How about you?”

He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Allison called when she got home from dropping you off,” he told her. “She asked that you call her back right away once your flight got in.”

He pursed his lips. “Luther said she sounded upset.”

Oh. Yeah, Vanya could see how she might be. Their goodbye at the terminal in Florida had been… eventful.

She hoisted her violin case higher on her shoulder, like it would protect her from the intensity of Five’s gaze.

“Just, um. Checking to make sure I got here safe, probably,” she said. She forced a smile. “Well, ready to go?”

Five regarded her with naked suspicion for a long moment.

“Sure.”

On the walk to the garage where he’d parked, she regaled him with stories of her trip. She was sure he didn’t care about what being on a movie set was really like, or the rare, purple piece of seaglass she had found, but it spared her from having to answer questions like _‘What got Allison bent out of shape?’_ or _‘Why would you do that?’_

“—forgot to put sunblock on the tops of my feet, though. So. I guess I’m done with sandals.”

Vanya stopped to take a breath as they merged onto the freeway. This had to be the most she’d ever talked in a single sitting in her entire life. How did Klaus _do_ it?

Five, who had contributed nothing to the conversation aside from an occasional nod or grunt of agreement, glanced at her from the driver’s seat.

“Fascinating,” he said flatly. “Are you going to tell me what you and Allison fought about now, or would you rather keep trying to distract me?”

Vanya shifted in discomfort. “We didn’t fight,” she said. “There was just… um…” She squinted at a billboard out the window as they passed by. “Hey, do you know what Big Lou’s is? The sign doesn’t say.”

“Vanya.”

She sighed. “It’s really nothing,” she murmured. “It’s just, I told her about Katie. Sort of. And I guess she has, like. Questions.”

Five darted a sharp glance at her. “That’s what got her upset?” His voice was stiff.

Vanya fiddled with the buckle of her seatbelt. “I think… I think it was maybe more the way I told her?” she said tentatively.

“The way you told her,” he repeated. “Which was how, Vanya? Did you write it in pig’s blood on her bathroom mirror? Hire a marching band? _What?”_

She sank low into her seat. She would sink all the way through the floor of the car if she could. “Well… I was going to tell her earlier, but there never seemed to be a good time? So I just did it after we said goodbye at the security checkpoint.”

Judging by the look Five gave her, he knew there was more to the story than that. He always knew.

Wishing she had asked Luther to come pick her up, Vanya closed her eyes and admitted, “I yelled ‘I’m gay’ through a plastic wall and then I ran away.”

Five snorted.

“We got there late,” she explained defensively. “My flight was boarding in ten minutes and I still had to go through security and it was my last chance and… I don’t know. I panicked?”

“No shit.”

She let her head fall back against the rest with a sigh. “I’ll call her when I get home.”

“Sounds like a plan.” He reached for the water bottle in the cup holder, and his elbow jostled hers. “But it’s good that you told her.”

She looked at him from the corner of her eye. “You think?”

“Mm.” His gaze was fixed on the road, serene. “It was brave of you. Hilarious. But also brave.”

Vanya offered him a wobbly smile. Five was the toughest person she’d ever met, but there was a little soft spot deep inside him, and it was in the shape of their family. She wished he’d let everyone else see it sometimes. He guarded it so closely.

“I missed you while I was gone,” she told him.

His mouth puckered. “Stop that.”

“Stop missing you?”

“Stop getting emotional.”

“I’m not,” she protested, biting back a smile. “I just want to tell you how I feel.”

“Don’t.”

“Seeing your face makes me happy.”

_“Stop.”_

“You’re nice and I like you.”

He threw her a withering look.

She leaned closer. “If I had to choose between hanging out with you and having my fingernails torn out,” she said seriously, “I would choose hanging out with you.”

His hands clenched the steering wheel tight. “One week with Allison, and look at what you’ve become,” he muttered.

{}{}{}{}{}

Diego picked up a ceramic lizard with jeweled eyes and turned it over in his hands.

“This has to be something,” he said. “Right?”

Ben shrugged. “I think it’s just a decoration.”

Diego gave him a dirty look and shook the lizard next to his ear. “Why would they put a random decoration in here?”

“Because if everything was a clue, the game would be over in five minutes?”

Diego ignored him in favor of inspecting the bottom of the figurine with his flashlight.

Over on the other side of the room, Vanya was watching Five slide glass tiles around on a table.

“Wait,” she said, grabbing his wrist. “I think that’s it.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Yeah, look.” She tapped her finger on them. “4-4-4-4. That’s the combination for the box, I bet.”

He studied the tiles with a frown. “It can’t be. Why would they make it so easy?”

“Guys,” said Ben. “We still need to figure out what the key opens. We only have fifteen minutes left.”

“Don’t look at me,” Klaus said sulkily. He was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, the feathered collar of his shirt ruffling under the air from the vent. “I wanted to go to New Orleans.”

Luther was fiddling with the silver box on the stone ledge by the entrance, and something clicked as the lid popped open.

“Got it,” he announced. “It _was_ 4-4-4-4.”

Five glared at the tile game like it had just brought home a disappointing report card.

“What’s in it?” Ben asked.

Luther pulled out something small and glittering, dwarfed by his giant hand.

“Another key.”

Ben looked down at the key in his own hand. How did they have two of them, and zero locks?

Were they, like… stupid?

“Maybe we have to break it,” Diego mused out loud, still stuck on the lizard.

The intercom crackled to life. “None of the set pieces need to be broken in order to solve the puzzle,” a voice informed them.

Diego scowled at the ceiling. “We said no hints!”

Vanya bumped her knee against the table, then froze. “This is hollow,” she said, sliding a hand underneath it. “It’s—Oh, there’s a latch.”

Five helped her pull it free, and from the drawer, took out… another key.

Klaus studied his nails. “I bet we wouldn’t be having this problem if we’d gone to Mardi Gras.”

Ben sighed. They were going to be stuck in the temple forever.

{}{}{}{}{}

Diego rolled the mop and bucket back to the supply closet slowly, so the wheels wouldn’t squeak.

The only person still there was one of the coaches, working out his disappointment over his protégé’s loss that afternoon with an 80-pound bag. Well, him and—

“You leaving early?” a crabby voice said from behind him.

Diego sighed. “The floors are done, the bathrooms are done, and nobody is here, Al.”

“Julian is.”

“Julian works here,” he said, turning around. “He can let himself out.”

Al’s eyes narrowed. “You could stay,” he said. “Get some time in on the bags.”

Diego shook his head and closed the closet door. “I have shit to do.”

It was like a dam broke. “Oh, for the love of God, Hargreeves!” Al cried. “Give it a fucking rest! You ain’t some one-man police—“

“I’m dropping off job applications,” Diego spit out.

Al blinked, mouth agape in mid-tirade.

“Listen,” Diego said savagely. “I’ve worked for you for twelve years, and I’m not going to stick around and let you treat me like I’m some kind of asshole. _Twelve fucking years, Al._ I don’t know what the hell crawled up your ass lately, but good luck finding anyone else who’s going to—“

“I’m selling the gym,” Al interrupted.

You couldn’t have robbed Diego’s breath faster if you’d kneed him in the grapes. He stared in stunned silence as Al’s rheumy eyes roved over the room.

“This is place is running me into the ground anymore. Figure it’s time to retire.”

He sounded oddly at peace with it. Diego swallowed.

“You, uh. You get any offers?”

“A few.” Al looked to him. “Not from anybody interested in running a boxing gym. They just want the building. Hard to come by a lot this big nowadays.”

“Right.” Diego glanced down at the floor. “Well. Guess it’s good I already started looking for something else.”

He had a lead for a security job in a big box store. So, that would be… a paycheck.

“Yeah,” said Al. “Was hoping maybe someone here would buy it. But nobody’s got the money.”

Of course they didn’t. You didn’t get rich working in a place like this. It was something you did for love.

“Was hoping,” Al went on, “that somebody with cash to burn might step up and take over.”

Diego realized that he was watching him very closely. He also realized that the faint thudding noises in the background had stopped, and he turned to look across the room.

“Don’t mind me,” Julian said quickly. He adjusted the tape on his right hand. “Just… eavesdropping on your conversation.”

Diego looked back to Al with narrowed eyes. “I can’t afford it, either.”

Al sighed. “Hargreeves—“

“No,” he cut him off, because all of a sudden, he was deeply, riotously angry. “No, _fuck_ you. When I started working here, you told me not to expect any handouts, remember? And I told you, I don’t want any. As far as I’m concerned, the only fucking money I have is the money I earned.”

He expected Al to start yelling at him, but instead, he just sort of… drooped. It was easy to forget how old he really was when he was stomping around cursing everyone out. It was impossible to miss it now.

“I ain’t asking you to take a handout,” he said. “I’m asking you to do me a favor. This place is the only mark I’m leaving on the world, kid— I don’t want to see it die before I do.”

And what about Diego’s mark on the world, he wondered? He didn’t want to be the guy who bought a business with Daddy’s money. He didn’t want to be the guy who couldn’t hack it on his own without the family name to break his fall when he stumbled.

He didn’t want to live his life in the shadow of Reginald Hargreeves.

“Everybody’s good with you being the boss as long as you keep reimbursing us for equipment,” Julian called from across the gym.

Diego glared at him.

He raised his hands in defense. “I’m fifty-three years old and I don’t want to start looking for a new job now. All I’m saying.”

Al hooked his thumbs through his suspenders. “Think about it,” he said. “Alright? You owe me that much.”

Diego stared again at the floor. How many hours of his life had he spent cleaning it? He had tended to every inch of this place at one time or another, over the years.

“Fine,” he said. “Fine. I’ll think about it.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This revelation isn't all that shocking, is it? Everyone figured out Al wanted Diego to take over the gym in chapter one. But he's shocked, so I'm counting it.
> 
> Image descriptions to come later, once I have time!


	3. August

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Self, and Romance vs. Fish (part deux).

“Sit,” Ben ordered, holding a cracker over the dog’s head. Her nails clicked like miniature tap shoes on the kitchen floor as she wriggled in excitement.

“Sit,” he tried again. “Can you sit?”

As it turned out, she could not. She _could_ jump up and snatch the cracker from between his fingers without accidentally biting him, though, which was maybe the next best thing.

As she gulped it down, Klaus saluted with his orange juice from the table. “Way to go, Appletini! Stick it to the man!”

Diego glanced up from his oatmeal. “Appletini? I thought its name was Dixie or some shit.”

“Trixie,” Ben corrected. He knelt down to let the dog lick his face. “But she doesn’t really respond to anything you call her, anyway.”

She also didn’t really respond to scolding, praise, or any of the commands he had tried. It wasn’t that she was dumb—she had already worked out everyone’s schedules well enough that she knew which times to wait at the backdoor for her daily offerings of snacks— it was just that she was determined to do exactly as she pleased, at all times.

This dog was such a rebel that she wouldn’t even acknowledge Rebel as her name.

Diego reached over to steal one of Klaus’s sausage links and held it low to the ground. “Come here, Swampass.”

Ben was about to tell him off, but there was a sudden crack, and then a bleary-eyed Five stood in their midst.

The dog swerved away from Diego with a joyous bark and began whacking her tail against his legs as she minnowed around him.

He looked down at her for nearly a full minute. His brain was soup in the early morning, but Ben could almost see him fitting the puzzle pieces together.

Their eyes met.

“Did you let this dog in here?” Five demanded croakily.

“Yup.” Ben crossed his legs on the floor. “It’s supposed to rain most of the week. We can’t leave her outside.”

In six days, he was going to be in the Philippines, so he needed to make provisions for the dog now.

Or, well. In six days, he’d _probably_ be in the Philippines. Maybe. There was a definite possibility, that that was where he would be.

Three weeks ago, he’d thought he was going for sure. But three weeks was a long time, and he had spent it developing an itemized list of every way this all might go wrong.

  * He’d miss his first connecting flight and get on a plane to Switzerland by accident
  * That plane would crash in the middle of the ocean
  * He’d be the same amount of dead as he always was, but he’d have to walk across the seafloor in the general direction of home, and it would take weeks
  * He would miss his turn taking out the garbage, and everyone would get in a massive fight about who had to do it instead, and then they’d all move out and stop speaking to one another forever
  * Klaus would buy himself an RV to live in and drive it through a Dunkin Donuts by accident
  * Jail
  * A year from now, Cora would show back up in New York and introduce him to her new boyfriend



But at least the dog would be in good stead while their lives blew up.

Five scooted backwards as she stuck her nose in his crotch. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”

“Aw, leave Appletini alone,” Klaus scolded. He made a kissy face at her. “She’s a little cutie! Yes, yes she is!”

“Better than the fucking cats, at least,” muttered Diego.

Ben rolled his eyes once he was preoccupied with his oatmeal. Diego had been leaving his bedroom door open a crack so they could sleep with him if they wanted since basically the first day they’d brought them home.

“The cats,” Five echoed. “They’ll fight.”

He pointed at Trixie/Dixie/Appletini/Rebel/Swampass. “This dog is going to murder your cats, Ben.”

“She won’t,” he said. “You just have to introduce them the right way. Tons of people have both.”

“Dead cats.”

“No.”

“Gone before their time.”

“Shut up.”

“We could have prevented this tragedy, and yet, we did not.”

“We’re not putting the dog out in the rain, either, dude.”

The door opened and Mom stepped inside with the hot pink curtain Klaus had stolen from Jillian draped over her arm.

“Look, children!” She unfurled the fabric to show them that she had sewn dozens of black buttons to it, and added a strip of dark green lace to the bottom. “Doesn’t it look like a watermelon?”

Diego swallowed his food. “It does,” he agreed. “It’s great, Mom. But… Why’d you do that, though?”

“I saw it in a magazine,” she explained.

Klaus was studying it with marked distaste. “Are you going to put it in the window?”

“Oh, no, dear.” Mom held it out to examine it, smiling. “It’s rather unattractive, isn’t it? Just like the picture!”

Cthulhu Cat darted in past her ankles, and froze, one paw in mid-flounce, when he caught sight of the dog.

The dog halted her investigation of Five’s pajama pants to sniff the air.

They stared at each other across the room.

Klaus sucked in a breath. Diego’s whole frame tensed. Ben was too far away to grab either animal, and while his life hadn’t flashed before his eyes when he had died, it did now.

Then Cthulhu turned away, tail flicking in disinterest, and continued to his water dish. The dog yawned.

Ben let out a shaky breath. “Good dog,” he murmured.

Five was glaring after Cthulhu like he had just spit in his face. “You’re _useless,”_ he hissed.

The dog licked Five’s fingertips in consolation.

“Go sit down someplace,” he snapped.

To Ben’s wonderment, she planted herself on his foot.

Luther breezed in then, carrying the newspaper and a glossy black envelope.

“Is one of you expecting mail from a casino out in Yonkers?” he asked, turning the envelope around to show them. “They sent us a voucher for five dollars.”

Ben rose from the floor. “That’s just a promotional thing, I think.”

“Yeah, but you can turn it into real money!” Klaus was tipping his chair backwards to try to grab it from Luther’s hands. “All you do is go and play a quarter game one time, and then you tell them you want to cash out.”

Diego licked his spoon clean. “You want us to drive an hour in each direction to defraud a casino of $4.75,” he said flatly. “That seems like a good use of time to you.”

Klaus rocked his chair back into place and extended his hand. “Hi! I’m Klaus Hargreeves, and I’m thirty-one years young. I’m studying to be a cosmetologist, I’m not single but I still like to mingle platonically, and my favorite color is glitter.”

Diego frowned at him.

“I’m telling you all this because you’re acting like you’ve never met me.”

“We could just go and see how it is,” Luther suggested. He looked from Klaus to Ben. “I’ve never been to a casino before.”

Five accepted the coffee their mother was offering him and warped into a chair. The dog tilted her head, confused.

“I have,” he said. “It was—“

“No stories about murder before noon,” Ben reminded him.

Five sipped his coffee in silence.

“Well, maybe we could go somewhere else and do something?” Luther suggested. “Like, we could go to a museum, or…”

He trailed off, frowning, apparently unsure of what else people did for pleasure.

“…Look at…a different museum?”

“But what will we do after that?” Diego asked. “You don’t think New York City has a _third_ museum, do you?”

“Two museums and a roller rink,” Klaus told him through a mouthful of French toast. “I heard we might be getting a Denny’s soon, too.”

Ben threw them a reproving look, though neither of them seemed very reproved by it—Diego ignored him, and Klaus made a heart shape with his hands.

“I’m going to make a list of stuff we should do,” Luther decided, either unaware of or unbothered by the rain on his parade.

Ben fiddled with the cuff on his hoodie. Luther had always been such a stickler for routine. If he was up for an adventure…

“I’m going to the Philippines on Saturday,” Ben blurted out. “Can I have a ride to the airport?”

Diego looked up at him, startled, as Klaus choked on his orange juice.

After a long moment, Luther closed his mouth.

“Well… I was thinking more like, let’s go have a picnic or see a movie or something, but… that works too, I guess?”

{}{}{}{}{}

Klaus took a deep breath in and let the sounds of the rain forest filter through his mind.

It was a CD he’d unearthed in Five’s room while on a hunt for nail clippers—one of those white noise (green and leopard print noise?) things that was supposed to help you relax.

It had still been in its cellophane packaging.

It was working, though, he thought. He imagined being in a tropical paradise, warm and mysterious, while unseen birds twittered their strange songs from the trees.

It was almost like Vietnam, but not. There was no danger here. Only a friend, and he was beyond the next bush—

Klaus opened his eyes and swallowed a screech of alarm.

A man with half a face was sitting there, legs crossed on the floor in front of him like they were playing tea party.

“Hi, Angelo,” Klaus said shakily.

“Alugh,” Angelo greeted him.

Klaus scooted backwards. “Uh… are you looking for Ben and Dave?”

The only answer he got was more indecipherable gibberish.

“What?” he asked. “Just shake your head yes or no.”

Angelo nodded. His tongue oozed sideways out of the hole in his cheek.

“They’re not here,” Klaus said, trying to repress a shudder. They both swore up and down that Angelo was a good guy and Klaus would like him if he could understand what he was saying, but he was just so… _goopy._ “They were going to go try to kick rocks into the quarry, I think. Boys being boys!”

Angelo made a noise that sounded disappointed. It also sound very wet.

“Okay, well, um. I’ll tell them you stopped by.”

Angelo said… something.

“Come again?”

He made the same noises, louder, like this communication barrier was surmountable by volume.

Klaus frowned. “Uh… still not catching that. Here, okay—first syllable?”

Angelo pantomimed what might have been taking off a hat.

Klaus did it back to him. “I take my hat off to you, too, sir.”

He shook his head and tapped the side of it.

“What? Is that supposed to be ‘sounds like?’” Klaus guessed.

Angelo rolled his eyes, exasperated.

“You don’t have an ear there!” Klaus protested. “I’m not a mind reader! Okay, you know what? This is for the birds.”

He got up and started tearing through his dresser, then turned around with a pharmacy receipt and an eyeliner pencil.

“I’m making you physical for a minute so you can write,” he told Angelo. He shook a warning finger at him. “But you better not do anything crazy, or I’m telling on you when Dave gets home.”

Angelo held up his hands in appeasement.

Klaus’s own hands glowed blue, and he held his breath as Angelo turned his eyeliner over between his fingers. Clumsily, as though no longer used to such fine motions.

ARE YOU LOOKING FOR A GHOST

Klaus looked up from the receipt, surprised.

“How’d you know?”

I HEARD YOU

IT WAS LIKE YOU WERE CALLING SOMEONE ELSE’S NAME

BUT YOU DIDN’T SAY ANYTHING

I CAN’T EXPLAIN IT

“Oh, shit,” Klaus breathed.

It was working, then. It _had_ to be. He was never really sure how close he got to conjuring any specific ghost—he hadn’t attempted it enough to find out—but this was like… progress.

Angelo was writing again.

DO YOU WANT TO TAKE APART YOUR TELEVISION

Klaus scowled at him. “What? No.”

Though, now that he mentioned it…

“I… kind of want to take apart the television,” he amended. “But people would get mad.”

Angelo nodded in understanding.

DO YOU WANT TO SEE IF I CAN GET ~~ELECTRIK~~ ~~ELECTRAR~~ ELECTROCUTED IF I PUT I A FORK IN A WALL SOCKET

“Oh, well, yeah,” Klaus agreed, pleasantly surprised. “Come on, let’s go to the kitchen and scare everybody.”

He led Angelo down the hall with a spring in his step.

Sometimes, the _real_ friends were the ghosts you accidentally conjured along the way.

{}{}{}{}{}

Diego clacked an ice cube between his teeth as he watched Vanya and the captain of her pool team in the mirror behind the bar.

The game was over, and the rest of the team had bounced since there was a birthday party going on at their home bar, but he had asked to talk to her.

Diego watched him grip her shoulder with one enormous hand. His name was Jason or Johnny or something, he thought, and he was a big guy, easily as tall as Luther—and Vanya smiled up at him.

Something uncomfortable trickled through Diego’s stomach at the sight. God knew Vanya could handle herself and he seemed like an alright enough dude, but Jesus, she could have fit _inside_ of him.

He hoped Allison wasn’t going to start dating again anytime soon. He was not ready.

Vanya came over to join him, and Jason-Johnny began packing up his stuff.

“Hey,” she said, settling into the seat next to him. “Sorry about that. Ready to go?”

“Finish your beer,” he instructed. “You’re not taking it in my car.”

“Of course not.” Her voice was serious, but there was a smile in her eyes.

Diego took a mouthful of his water. “So. What’d he want to talk to you about?” he asked, jerking his head off to their right.

“Oh. I’m moving up a rank,” she said, with bashful pride. “So. I don’t know. Sort of cool, I guess.”

Diego clinked his glass against her bottle. “Go get ‘em.”

The smile spread to her mouth. “Thanks.”

Diego eyed her as she sipped her beer. “You dating him?”

She lowered her bottle, eyes wide. “Am I dating Joey?” she asked. “God, no. He’s um… not really my type?”

Yeah, he could see how that might be the case. He really was an alright guy, but after a few drinks, he’d start spouting off about shit like the Illuminati and UFOs.

More of an okay guy, really. Well. Okay _ish._

“He’s fucking stupid,” Diego realized out loud.

“No, I—Well, yeah, he kind of is, but…” Vanya started tearing the label off her beer in little strips. “You know, um. You know Katie?”

Diego racked his brain. “No.”

“She’s also on the team? And that night you came to my apartment after you got shot, she was there and she started screaming? And then you met her, like… a ton more times after that?”

“Oh, right. Her.” He took another drink of his water. “She’s dating dipshit?”

“No.” Vanya brushed the scraps of paper aside, squared her shoulders, and took a deep breath. “She’s dating me.”

Diego frowned into the mirror. First Klaus, now Vanya? Fuck, he did not have any kind of gaydar at all, did he?

Next he’d be finding out Morillo from the gym was into dudes, and _that_ was why he kept asking if Diego wanted to go have dinner with him.

Vanya was watching him, biting at her lip. Oh. He… probably should say something, instead of sitting there looking mad.

He shifted in his seat. “So, uh. The bartender is pretty hot, right?”

Vanya’s brow furrowed. “What?”

“Got a great ass.”

“Are you trying to, like… bond, by objectifying women together?”

“You could bounce a quarter off it,” he finished stubbornly.

Vanya covered half of her face with one hand. “Please stop this.”

“Fine,” Diego muttered.

He was still going to think it, though. He watched from the corner of his eye as she stooped down to get a bottle of vermouth off the bottom shelf. God, it was like two Christmas hams down the back of her pants.

He and Vanya both fell silent as they worked on their respective drinks. This time last year, it would have felt awkward, but it was easy, now.

There had been a lot of resentment between them, once—he’d been an ass to her for most of their early lives because she was an easy target, then she’d written that book, and then he had allowed Luther to lock her up against his own better judgement, and she had retaliated by trying to kill them all, and—

At some point, it was just simpler to wipe the scorecard clean and start over. New day, new leaves, whatever.

Vanya set her bottle down and wiped the corner of her mouth with a thumb. “Are you going out tonight?” she asked. “To do your…?”

“Oh. No.” He shifted in his seat. “That’s on the backburner for now. Work stuff.”

He wasn’t sure why, but without prompting, he added, “Al’s selling the gym. He, uh. He wants me to buy it.”

Vanya made a soft noise of surprise. “Oh, wow,” she murmured. “Are you going to?”

Diego clenched his jaw. “With what money?”

“A loan?” she suggested.

He shook his head. “I got shit credit. Bought a car I couldn’t afford when I was eighteen.”

“…Right.” She looked away from him, and resumed peeling the label off her beer.

“I… haven’t really touched what Dad left us, either,” she admitted, cautious. “I bought a new mattress with it. That’s all.”

She glanced at him. “I guess it’s the one thing he did for us that we should be thankful for, but… I don’t _want_ to thank him for anything. You know?”

Yeah. He knew. And it felt… reassuring _,_ to hear that she did, too.

The rest of them didn’t get it. Klaus was just happy to be off the street, and Five was just happy to be back in a timeline where the concept of indoors existed at all. Ben had no need for material things, Allison was wealthy in her own right, Luther was basically _owed_ that money for his years of dedicated, pointless, shit-for-brains service.

He and Vanya were normal, work-a-day sort of people. Money could give you freedom, but there was a freedom in being self-reliant, too.

“Fuck him,” Diego said amicably.

Vanya smiled at the bar. “Yeah. I, um. When I was deciding what mattress to get, I was doing price comparisons. You know, seeing how much the one I wanted cost at different places?”

She turned to him with a light in her eyes. “I went with the most expensive one on purpose.”

Dad would be rolling in his grave, if he had one.

Instead, he had been dumped into a dust clump in the middle of the courtyard, and Diego was letting his hard-earned money gather cobwebs in a bank someplace, and Vanya was making it rain on unscrupulous mattress salesmen.

Diego clinked their drinks together again.

Living well was the best revenge.

{}{}{}{}{}

Luther watched from the van as Klaus and Ben embraced on the curb outside the airport.

“Okay,” said Ben. “Okay, you can let go of me now.”

“No I can’t!” Klaus cried. “My baby is going off to college! I’m not ready!”

“Literally none of that is correct.”

“You’re going to come home with an earring and tattoos after I spent nine months making those perfect little ears!”

“Why are you the mother in this scenario?”

Five rolled down the passenger side window.

“There’s a fifteen minute limit here,” he told them irritably. “Get in the fucking car, Klaus.”

Klaus’s hands glowed blue and Ben disappeared from the circle of his arms.

“Alright,” he sighed, taking a step backwards. “This is it. No wild parties when I’m not there for you to supervise me, got it?”

Whatever response Ben gave was a mystery to Luther, but Dave snorted in the backseat and Klaus put his hands on his hips.

“Okay, you know what, I’m turning your bedroom into a home office while you’re gone,” he said testily. “Have a nice vacation, sass-mouth.”

Luther tracked what might have been Ben’s path inside as Klaus climbed into the backseat. He’d been nervous about this whole thing—he’d almost backed out that morning, in fact, until Dave had given him a pep talk—but there he went, presumably.

Ben had always been the shy one. If he could do it...

“Fifteen minutes,” Five reminded him.

They pulled away.

As Luther merged onto the freeway, Klaus leaned his head against the window and sighed.

“Why do the good ghosts always leave me?” he lamented. He made a motion of encouragement to Dave with one hand. “Tell me about your undying love and devotion to cheer me up, Davey.”

“You have my undying love and devotion,” Dave promised.

“Yay!”

Five rested his elbow against the glass. “I don’t see what he wants to go to the Philippines for, anyway,” he said. “Just look at some pictures of it. Same thing.”

“I think it’s good,” said Luther, glancing at Dave in rear view mirror for backup. “He’ll have fun with his friend and everything. I just wish we had a way to contact him if we needed to.”

He hadn’t wanted to be a downer and bring it up to Ben, but what if the house burned down or someone wound up in the hospital or something while he was away? He’d be sitting on a beach with no idea.

“Oh, we planned for that,” Klaus told him, still a little moody. “We developed a fool-proof system in case of emergencies. Thus cementing my status as the family genius.”

Luther and Five shared a brief look.

Well, they probably wouldn’t need to reach him for anything, anyway.

“I, uh… “ Luther cleared his throat. “I’ve been thinking about going to Florida. To see Allison.”

There. Now the words were out in the world, and there was no taking them back.

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea,” said Klaus. “Going to Rhode Island behind her back was sort of fucked up of us.”

“More than sort of,” Dave agreed cheerfully.

Luther tapped his thumbs on the steering wheel. “I thought you guys had fun.”

“Oh, we did.” Klaus waved a listless hand. “It was great. I don’t regret it. Still fucked up, though.”

“I regret it a little bit,” said Dave. “Not that much. It was a good time.”

Luther frowned at him in the mirror, and he shrugged.

“Florida is where my generation goes to die. The last time I was there, the ghost of one of the neighbors from my first apartment found me on a beach in Key West and started telling me how sorry she was I died before I could get married and have kids. I told her not to sweat it, and then one thing led to another, and I ended up explaining how gay sex works to somebody’s grandma. Fuck if I’m having a conversation like _that_ ever again.”

Klaus smiled at him. “You have the best stories.”

“It’s been strange not having Allison around,” Five said mildly, gazing out the window.

A perturbed silence settled over the car.

Had Five just had a feeling?

“Big Lou needs a better advertising agency,” he commented, nodding at something outside. “What kind of idiot forgets to put what their business does on their sign?”

Oh. Feeling over, Luther supposed. He was good with that.

“I was thinking I might drive,” he said. “Instead of flying. So, if anyone else wants to come…”

“School,” said Klaus.

“Invisible,” said Dave.

“I don’t have an excuse, I’m just not going,” said Five.

Vanya had already visited and things were still tenuous with Diego’s job, so…

Driving a thousand miles alone wouldn’t be that bad, he told himself. It would… build character. And a tolerance for crushing boredom.

Klaus suddenly sat up in his seat. “Oh, hey!” he said, whacking Luther’s shoulder. “Are you getting a swimsuit?”

“Oh.” He frowned at the road. “I… hadn’t really thought that far ahead. I guess. Maybe?”

“Because we just started esthetics,” Klaus said, his face shining with hope. “So. Practice would be good, if you feel like being a nice person who cares about me and supports my hopes and dreams.”

Luther glanced to Five for a hint, but none was forthcoming.

“What does esthetics mean?” he asked warily.

“Oh, you know. It’s like.” Klaus cupped his hands around his mouth. _“Waxing.”_

“Oh, _no,”_ Luther said, aghast.

“But my hopes and dreams, though!”

“I don’t care about them _that_ much!”

“What about being spontaneous and trying new things, then?” Klaus asked in a ‘gotcha’ kind of way.

“Yeah, Luther,” said Five. His smirk was reflected in the window. “What about that?”

Luther threw a desperate glance to Dave in the rear view.

“Uh… you can squeeze my hand?” he offered apologetically.

“Do iiiit,” Klaus urged, leaning forward between the two front seats. “Let me make you smooooth.”

Luther stared ahead at the road. It seemed to go on forever, like it could swallow him up.

“Okay,” he said bleakly. “Fine.”

He wasn’t squeezing Dave’s hand during it, though. He could have _stopped_ this, the traitor.

{}{}{}{}{}

{}{}{}{}{}

It was 88 degrees, with 100% humidity and winds at only 2 miles per hour.

A very uncomfortable day for a human, but Grace didn’t mind. What could be as lovely as going for a stroll on a summer afternoon?

She paused a moment to watch a fat bumblebee circle the flowers in someone’s window boxes. Perhaps next it would visit their garden at home, she thought, and share its pollen with them. She smiled. The city was a living thing.

She had half a mind to follow that bee and see where its travels would take them, but she had a job to do.

Humming, Grace approached a telephone pole and pulled one of the fliers Five had made from the stack she carried. They had been putting them up each week and, so far, no one had called to claim the dog, but Five kept saying things like, _‘We’re not keeping this {expletive} thing’_ or _‘Somebody better come get this {expletive} dog soon.’_

He was so determined to reunite it with its owner. Such a sweetheart!

She was just about to staple the flier in place, when an annoyed voice behind her said, _“Excus_ e me.”

There was a woman there, a bit older than the children, holding a paper coffee cup and wearing a pair of oversized sunglasses.

“You know you can’t do that, right?” the woman asked. She gestured to the pole with her cup. “It’s illegal to put things up on these.”

Oh. Was it? Grace thought the matter over.

She knew that it was a common practice. The pole she was at now had a notice about a room for rent, in fact, and the lingering staples of many, many papers past.

She was meant to obey the law, of course, but it seemed social convention dictated that putting things on telephone poles was acceptable. And following social convention was equally important in maintaining a civilized society, was it not?

That had always been Sir Reginald’s most important goal—to keep the world ticking on as usual.

The woman took a step away from her. “What’s wrong with you?” she asked. “What are you staring at?”

“Oh, I don’t stare,” Grace assured her. “It’s quite rude, you see.”

The woman’s mouth twisted into a frown. “Look, you can’t just go around putting things on public property. It’s _vandalism.”_

She sounded angry. The heat must be bothering her, Grace thought with sympathy. Humans were so sensitive to changes in temperature. It was a very unfortunate design flaw.

Grace held the flier up to the pole, and pressed the stapler to it with a crisp ‘click!’

She turned back to the woman with a smile.

“Well, I suppose that I’m a vandal!” she said brightly. “My, what an exciting day this is!”

The woman’s face screwed up like she had tasted something bitter. Her mouth parted, but she didn’t respond, as though the words were stuck under her tongue.

After a moment, Grace leaned forward a little.

“It’s quite rude to stare,” she reminded her helpfully. “I hope you have a wonderful afternoon!”

Humming once more, she continued her way up the street.

She would have to tell the children about this once she got home. Her dear, serious Luther might be disappointed in her, but how Klaus would laugh to know his mother was a criminal.

{}{}{}{}{}

**The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire**

**On March 25 th, 1911, a fire started in a garment factory on the 8th floor of the Asch Building in Greenwich Village. It quickly spread to the 9th and 10th floors, accelerated by months’ worth of accumulated scraps of fabric. Unable to escape through the locked doors, many workers jumped to their deaths from the windows. Others died of smoke inhalation, injuries from leaping down the elevator shafts, or from tumbling off the fire escape as it collapsed. All told, the fire claimed 146 victims.**

**Press the red button to learn more.**

“Do you want to press the button?” Luther asked.

Vanya shook her head. “I think I got the gist of it.”

She’d been a little surprised when Luther had called to ask if she wanted to go do something together, but she had agreed readily enough. They rarely hung out alone—it would be sort of fun, she thought.

And it _was_ fun. The most fun you could have at a museum dedicated to industrial accidents, anyway.

Luther was staring at the photo of the charred remains of the factory, looking pensive.

“You know,” he said slowly, “a while back, I was looking through some of Dad’s financial stuff to see what he had stocks in, and he’d written in one of his ledgers that he invested in something called the Triangle Waist Company.”

Vanya looked up at him. “This place burned down in 1911, Luther.”

“Yeah,” he agreed with a small frown. “Must have been a different one, I guess.”

…How old had their father been, when he’d died? She wasn’t sure—they had never celebrated his birthday or anything. She didn’t know when his birthday even was. Or who had given birth to him, for that matter, although he must have had parents someplace. Maybe in his hometown. Which was… in the UK, she guessed?

Huh.

“I don’t think I like this museum,” she decided.

“I don’t either.” Luther paused. “The next thing on my list is ‘ride the Staten Island ferry.’”

Vanya turned her back to the display. “Yeah, alright. Let’s go.”

Some mysteries just weren’t worth solving.

{}{}{}{}{}

Klaus wedged his bedroom window open with a book, and took a moment to admire the pink-purple sky of the summer evening.

That’s what he would focus on tonight, he decided. Ghosts in space! Maybe Star Wars did it first, but he would do it better.

He sat down on the bed, crossed his legs, and got started.

He imagined drifting high above the city, a shuttle heading into orbit. Stars passing through his hair as he ascended into the infinite blackness.

It wasn’t frightening—he knew a familiar face was waiting for him there, at the end of wherever his journey would take him.

He thought of the old man. The lines around his eyes. His weathered hands. His low voice saying ‘G’day, mate!’ and then Klaus almost laughed because he’d never actually said that, like, ever, but he forced himself stay on task.

He was floating… floating…

Klaus opened his eyes. He looked down at the floor for several long, unblinking seconds.

Well. The old man was still missing, but he was now hovering a full foot in the air, so… that was something, he guessed.

Klaus drew in a deep breath, and _screamed._

{}{}{}{}{}

“—and the kissing scene is finally done with,” Allison said, with a sigh of relief. “We shot it right after lunch, so _that_ was a fun and exciting way to get to know my co-star better.”

“Oh.” Luther scooped one of the cats off the desk to stop it biting at the phone cord. “Was his breath bad?”

“No, but it turns out he’s one of those people who think cilantro tastes like soap. Would have been nice to know that before I got Cuban food, but you live and you learn!”

Luther winced as the cat clawed its way up his chest to perch on his shoulder. “That’s one way to look at it.”

“Yeah, well, silver linings and such. Anyway, what’s going on over there?”

“Some big news, actually.” Luther adjusted the phone next to his ear. “It turns out Klaus can levitate. Like, in the air.”

There was a long pause on the other end. _“What?”_

“I know. I was pretty floored, too.” He frowned. “Sorry, that wasn’t supposed to be a pun.”

“Not super worried about puns right now, to tell you the truth,” Allison said, sounding awed. “I just—how? What exactly happened? Have you seen it?”

“No.” He tilted his head to the side, as the cat was now scratching her face against his beard. “It was only the once he managed it—I guess he was trying to conjure a ghost, and then… he was floating.”

“Shit,” Allison breathed in amazement.

That summed up the situation pretty well, Luther thought.

“How’s he taking it?” she asked. “Is he happy about it?”

“Well…”

After a few seconds of levitation, Klaus had screamed. And then he’d tumbled to the ground. Then he had cried for two straight hours, and then he’d laid face-down on the living room floor and talked about nihilism for another hour, and then he’d chain-smoked a whole pack of cigarettes, and then he’d threatened to punch Diego unless he took him to get ice cream, and then he’d eaten his ice cream while crying some more, and then he’d tried to talk Dave into having sex on the roof, and then he went to his bedroom and tried to levitate a second time.

“He’s… having some mixed feelings,” Luther decided.

“Yeah, I get that.” Allison made a sympathetic noise on the other end. “Oh, poor Klaus! This must be so overwhelming. Give him a hug for me, okay?”

“Sure.”

He’d certainly give him the _message_ that Allison wanted to give him a hug.

“Everything else is good, though?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said, running down the list. “Vanya came over for dinner the other day, she’s doing fine. Five still hasn’t found who owns the dog. I think Diego stopped looking for a new job, so I guess he sorted stuff out with Al. Oh, and Ben is in the Philippines! Did anyone tell you that?”

Allison didn’t answer right away. “No,” she said, her voice a little cool. “No, nobody mentioned it. What’s he doing there?”

Luther reached up a hand to stroke a finger down the cat’s back. “Visiting a friend. Another ghost.”

He checked to make sure the hallway was empty, and brought the phone closer to his face. “Diego thinks he has a crush on her, actually.”

That was normally the sort of thing that Allison would be all over, but instead, she said, “That’s awfully far away. What is it, like, twelve hours on a plane?”

“Seventeen with connections,” he told her.

Allison hummed tersely.

“Well,” she said. “It’s been nice talking to you, Luther. I’m going to have to let you go, but keep in touch.”

He frowned at the desk. That was a little… formal. Wasn’t it?

“Okay.” He hesitated. “Well, um. Bye.”

“Goodbye.”

The line cut off.

Luther set the phone down and strummed his fingers on the desk.

“Did I say something wrong?” he wondered out loud.

The cat nuzzled his neck, purring happily.

{}{}{}{}{}

Thunder clapped, and Five’s eyes snapped open.

It was too dark to see, and his mind was tangled like a ball of yarn—what kind of shelter had he made for himself? He couldn’t remember—was it raised? If he was flush to the ground there was the risk of flooding washing everything away, like the time he’d lost _weeks’_ worth of scavenged canned goods and nearly Dolores as well and—

There was a faint panting sound in the dark. Something cold and wet and alive nudged his hand.

A dog’s nose, he thought distantly.

The yarn untangled itself. He let out a breath.

He was at home, and he’d fallen asleep in an armchair. The papers he’d been working on crinkled in his lap as he shifted.

When his vision adjusted, he saw the dog, her chin resting on his knee and her eyes big and shiny in the dark.

He stroked a tentative hand over her head.

She was soft and warm, and he had the passing notion that if he pulled her into his lap and buried his face in her fur, she would stay there with him forever.

{}{}{}{}{}

Ben sat hip-to-hip with Cora on a sun-bleached dock, trailing his feet through the water of Batangas Bay. They were at a little cove, surrounded on all sides by green, sloping cliffs. A group of fishermen were cleaning their catch on a boat moored off to their left, and Cora was holding forth on her favorite topic while a radio played a song in a language Ben didn’t know.

“Ah, see that?” She pointed to a boat with a colorful, billowy sail that was drifting by like a carnival on water. “That’s a vinta boat. They come from the little islands much further south of here, but the tourists don’t know the difference.”

“Oh, cool,” said Ben.

“Mm. And that one—“ she pointed to a low-bottomed boat where a pair of men were hauling in a net of fish—“is called a bangka. Very common here. We’ve had them since before I was alive. The motors are new, though.”

“What’s that one called?” he asked, gesturing to a dinky little rowboat-looking thing.

She smiled at him. “A rowboat.”

Oh.

…No stupid questions?

Cora raised one arm and pointed off in the distance. “It’s too far to see,” she said, “but that way used to be the town where I was born.”

Ben didn’t answer right away. Cora, who had gone everywhere and done everything and been dead for centuries before he had ever been born, often seemed to him like a person removed from any specific time or place— a shooting star who had only come to exist once she was already in motion.

Learning that she had an exact point of origin felt like being let in on a secret. He would cherish it.

“Do you want to go visit?” he ventured.

She shook her head, the afternoon sun catching the droplets of water in her hair. “There’s nothing there for me today. When it’s time to move on to what comes after this world, I think, is when I’ll go back.”

Ben twisted around to face her, alarmed. “Is that… going to be soon, d’you think?”

Cora laughed. “Oh, what kind of hostess do you think I am, Ben? I won’t run off and leave you to find your own way home.”

“But after I go home?” he forced himself to ask.

“No, no. Not then, either.” She stirred the water with her foot. Her eyes were far away. “There _have_ been times, over the years, when I thought I was ready. I would say to myself, ‘Ah, well, now, I’ve seen everything there is to see. Now, I can go.’”

She tipped her head at him, a gentle smile pulling at her lips. “But something new always manages to catch my eye.”

If Ben’s heart had still beat, it would have been pounding out of his chest. Cora wasn’t a shooting star at all. She was right here next to him, and leaning closer. He didn’t have the ability to touch other ghosts, but she did, and he was going to—she was going to— _they_ were going to—

Fish guts splatted through both of them.

Cora burst out laughing, while Ben whipped around just in time to see the fisherman on the boat dump another basin.

He sighed down at what looked like a fish heart. What it actually was, though, was karma.

Somewhere, oceans away, Klaus had to be cackling with glee.

{}{}{}{}{}

Somewhere, oceans away—in New York, in his bedroom, to be specific—Klaus was throwing shoes at his closet door in frustration.

 _Why couldn’t he levitate again?_ He’d spent years and years looking at ghosts when he didn’t want to, and now that he actually _trying_ to use an ability —snake eyes.

It was bullshit, he thought darkly as he hurled a snow boot across the room.

Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit—

“Hey, Klaus, are you o—“

Dave looked down at his chest as a sneaker sailed through him.

“Wow, straight in the bullet wound,” he said. “Good arm.”

Klaus plopped down with a huff. “Sorry.”

“Eh, doesn’t hurt.” Dave crossed the room and crouched down in front of him. “How’re you doing?”

“Gangbusters,” Klaus snapped, then he blinked. “Oh. I thought you were about to ask ‘How’s it going?’”

Dave smiled at him. “You’ve been up here all morning,” he said gently. “Time for a break, you think?”

Klaus puckered up his mouth. _“No.”_

Figuring out his new ability was important. His new, stupid, actually-useful ability, which he had never asked for, but had apparently been lying there dormant this whole time.

He was jazzed about it, truly.

IT WAS A MOTHERFUCKING MIRACLE.

“Okay,” said Dave. “I was just thinking, one of your court shows is about to come on, and your mom is downstairs making chocolate chip cookies, so maybe—“

 _“No,_ David!” he cut him off. He waved a hand around. He wasn’t sure why, or what he was pointing to, but it made him feel better.

“Flying is more important than Judge Judy, and I’m not making any progress, and I’m not _going_ to if people keep interrupting me. Do you catch my drift, David? Are you picking up on this very subtle hint that I’m giving you?”

Instead of leaving, Dave sat down on the floor. “Can I share a theory?”

Klaus glared at him through his lashes.

Why was Dave so patient and nice and junk all the freaking time? It made it super hard to be a dick to him.

“Maybe you’re not making much progress because you don’t really want to,” Dave said. He phased a hand through Klaus’s hair. “Maybe you need more time to wrap your head around all this first, and _then_ you can work on it.”

He bent his neck so that their foreheads would almost be touching, if he was solid. “And that would be okay, sweetheart. There’s no pressure—you can go at your own pace.”

Klaus let his hands glow blue and pitched himself into Dave’s chest.

“I don’t _need_ this,” he said, hating how raw his voice sounded. “Everything was going so good, finally, and now there’s some other fucking thing I have to—“

He drew in a ragged breath, tears prickling his eyes. He had Dave and his siblings and school and sobriety and he was only one punch away on his Scoopz card from getting a free ice cream cone, and life was beautiful.

He’d started hoping that the rest of it was going to be one prolonged happy ending, not Volume 2 of _Surprise! You Have Superpowers!_

Volume 1 had been lame as hell. Volume 1 had _been_ hell.

Dave rubbed a hand up and down his back. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to—there was more comfort to be found in the familiar weight of his arms than in any words he could have spoken.

After a while, Klaus sighed deeply and straightened up. “I’m sorry I’ve been so crazy the past few days,” he said, wiping at his eyes. “Just, you know. Having an existential crisis. No biggie.”

Dave kissed his forehead. “You’ve got nothing to apologize for,” he said. “I mean, maybe to Diego you do. But I’m good.”

Oh. Yeah. The upholstery in his car was more sprinkles and tears than fabric, at this point.

“This… isn’t even that bad of a power,” he said, begging Dave with his eyes to confirm it. “Right? Falls somewhere between Allison’s and Five’s, on the seven point scale?”

“You’ll finally be able to catch a pigeon,” Dave agreed.

Klaus snorted, half out of surprise.

“And you can wear whatever shoes you want now. It doesn’t matter anymore if you can’t balance or if they’re too uncomfortable to walk in, you can just—“ Dave held his hand out flat and swiped it perpendicular to the floor —“hover.”

“Well,” said Klaus, a smile spreading across his face, “that _would_ be a game-changer.”

Dave nodded, looking utterly serious. “Know what the best part is?”

“What?”

He leaned closer. “You’ll _always_ win at The Floor Is Lava.”

Klaus laughed and nestled back into his arms. “Okay,” he said, smiling against Dave’s neck. “You’ve sold me on it. Levitation is the tits, I’m keeping it.”

“Good.” Dave carded his fingers through Klaus’s hair. “Want to keep practicing?”

“Another day,” Klaus said peacefully.

Maybe this wasn’t his happy ending, but that was alright. He’d be bored to tears by a life of perfect harmony, anyway, and he had never been meant to sit still for long.

A break was nice, though. An intermission before the next adventure started. He’d enjoy it, for now—smoke a cigarette, stretch his legs.

He ran a hand up Dave’s chest under his shirt.

…Maybe get himself a snack while he was at it.

{}{}{}{}{}

Allison sat cross-legged at the edge of the pool, smoking a cigarette and fuming.

They weren’t doing any filming the next day, which was a good thing because it was already two in the morning and she was piss drunk. Trying to recapture the magic of her night out with Vanya, she guessed, alone with a bottle of pinot noire.

It had not worked.

“Allison?” Luther’s voice crackled through the phone’s speaker. It was hoarse with sleep, but frantic with worry. “Allison, are you there? Mom just woke me up and said you needed to talk to me, what’s going on?”

Part of her wanted to just shut the phone off and let him wonder. But that would be pretty rotten, and more of her felt like yelling at someone, anyway.

She picked the phone up. “You tell _me_ what’s going on,” she snapped.

There was a brief silence. “Well… Mom woke me up and said you needed to talk to me?”

…Alright. Yeah. That had sounded more clever in her head.

“I wanted to tell you that you’re a jerk,” she said, taking a deep, vicious drag off her cigarette. She talked through the cloud of smoke as she exhaled. “And so’s Five and Diego and Klaus. All jerks! And Ben’s like, half a jerk. He could have told me himself he was going away, the coward.”

“Are you drinking?” Luther asked kindly. “You sound like you’ve been drinking.”

“So what if I’ve been drinking?” she demanded. “Earlier I was sober, and you guys were a bunch of assholes then, too.”

“Why do you keep saying stuff like that?” Luther asked. “What did I do?”

He sounded hurt, which was almost enough to make her feel bad, but she steeled herself against it. Being nice got you nowhere with these dickheads.

“You didn’t do anything,” she told him angrily. _“None_ of you guys did. How many times do you think I flew from California to New York this last year, Luther? Guess how many times.”

“A lot?” he asked, timid.

“Twenty-two, Luther!” She jabbed her cigarette into the air for emphasis. “And look! I survived! I went to visit you guys _twenty-two freaking times,_ and I didn’t even die a little bit from it. Amazing!”

There were some muffled sounds on the other end. Him sitting down, maybe.

“Is this about coming to see you in Florida?”

She let out a bray of humorless laughter. “OH, this is about more than coming to see me in Florida! I try, _really_ hard, with all of you guys, all of the time, and _nobody_ appreciates it, and I guess maybe I should just _stop_ because we’re a _trash family.”_

“We’re not a trash family,” Luther protested. “You know, I was talking to the guy who runs Science Camp earlier this week, and I realized that we actually spend a lot more time together than most other adult sib—“

“I know about Rhode Island,” she hissed into the phone. _“I know about Rhode Island!”_

There was a long pause. “I didn’t have anything to do with that,” he said warily.

“You didn’t tell me about it, either,” she said in triumph.

“Because I didn’t want to upset—“ He cut himself off with a sigh. “Allison, look. Someone besides Vanya should have gone to visit you. We know, okay? It’s been really weird not seeing you for so long, and everyone misses you, and we’re all sorry. And I already started planning out a route down there.”

She sat up, and the sudden motion made her head swim. _Goddammit,_ she hated spinning.

“What do you mean?” she asked suspiciously. “Planning a route where?”

“To Florida,” he said. “I was going to drive down. Maybe next week?”

She glared down at the water lapping at the side of the pool. “Maybe you’re not invited anymore.”

“Ah. What?”

“Maybe you’re not invited,” she repeated. “Maybe I take your invitation back.”

“Can… can you re-invite me?” he wondered.

“Maybe,” she said loftily. “If you have a good reason why I should.”

There was another pause. “Um. Okay. Because you have a pool?”

She responded with a derogatory sniff. “So does the YMCA.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” he muttered. “Because… you’re my sister? And I love you? And you do try hard to spend time with all of us, so… it’s only fair that we do that same.”

And just like that, all her boiling resentment cooled. Luther really was the best. And so were Vanya and Klaus and Five and Ben and Diego and their mom and Dave and that dopey dog and…

God, she was easy when she was drunk.

“Getting warmer.”

Might as well spin this out as long as she could, though. There were seven days in a week, Mr. I’m-booked-every-Thursday.

He groaned in defeat. “Allison, it’s two in the morning and I don’t know what you want me to say,” he told her pleadingly. “I miss you and I want to see you. Can I be re-invited? Please? I already bought some shorts. I cut off the tags. I can’t return them now.”

She smiled into the phone. Could he not wear shorts in New York? The inner workings of Luther’s mind were as baffling as they were delightful.

“I guess so,” she said, with false reluctance. “Let me know what day you’re going to get here.”

“Okay.” He hesitated. “We, um. We _are_ all sorry, you know.”

“As you should be.” Then, because he was never the best at picking up on jokes, she added, “Apology accepted. From you, not from Diego and Klaus. They can go kick rocks.”

Who even went to Rhode Island? Not people who wanted nice presents come Christmas, that was for sure.

“Alright, I’ll let them know.” Luther yawned. “Can I go back to bed now?”

“Why, do you have to get up early?” She laid down and splashed her feet in the pool. “I’ve been thinking about that ghost that Ben is visiting. The one you said he has a crush on? Has Klaus met her, or…?”

{}{}{}{}{}

Diego had been working at the weight bag so long that the sounds it made had started sounding like a song.

The thump of one fist, the creak of the chain, the thump of the other fist, the chain creaked longer—

“Diego?” a melodious voice floated through the air.

He stopped, the rhythm broken.

“Hey, Mom,” he said, wiping at his brow. “What’s up?”

Her heels clicked smartly as she drew closer. “I brought you some water, dear,” she said, holding out a glass. “You’ve been up here for quite a while—would you like some lunch?”

He took the water from her hand, drained half of it, and set it down on the bench. “Nah, I’m good.” He took a seat himself and adjusted the wrap on his hand. “I’m not done yet.”

His mother gathered up her skirt to sit next to him. “You’ve been very dedicated to your exercise routine lately.”

“Yeah.” He toyed with the loose end of the tape. “Helps me think.”

She laid a cool hand on the inside of his elbow. “Is something worrying you, dear?”

Diego thumbed at his nose. He hadn’t brought up buying the gym to anyone outside of Vanya—they all just had so many _opinions_ on shit, these fuckers. He didn’t need a bunch of voices in his ear pulling him in six different directions at once.

But if he couldn’t tell Mom, who could he tell?

“Al wants me to buy the gym from him so he can retire,” he said. “But the only way I could afford it is using what Dad left me, and I don’t want to do that.”

He lowered his gaze to the floor and rubbed his hands together. “I’m… not sure _what_ I should do.”

Mom hummed and stroked a hand over his sweaty hair. “Do you want to own the gym?” she asked.

Did he? He’d worked there twelve years. Lived there, for eleven of them. He knew everyone there, had trained alongside them, reveled in the same wins and commiserated over the same setbacks. The gym had been—hope, and home, and companionship, when it had felt like maybe he’d never have any of those things again.

“I don’t want to see it gone,” he said softly.

Mom laughed, not in an unkind way. Nothing about her was ever unkind. “Imagine my little Diego as the boss at his own business!”

He snorted. “I bet everyone would quit.”

“Oh, I don’t think they would, dear. I think you would be a wonderful boss.”

Something caught in his chest at the words.

“You’ve always been so good at looking after your brothers and sisters,” she went on. “You have a caring heart. And they all admire that about you, you know—that you’re someone they can rely on when they need help.”

Well. He tried to help. He enjoyed it, really, having people count on him. Need him.

That might have been the kind of hero he’d always wanted to be, he thought—not the kind who caught criminals and saved the world from certain doom, the kind who just… stepped in and handled shit, when other people wouldn’t or couldn’t.

Mom stroked his hair again. “You would be a _wonderful_ boss,” she repeated, firmer.

Diego smiled at the floor. “Yeah, well.” He bumped their shoulders together. “You think I’m good at everything. That’s how being a mom works.”

She laughed, light and tinkling. “Oh, no, dear. You all have your flaws, too, of course. I know that.”

Gently, she took both of his hands between hers, and looked into his eyes. “You are very proud, my dear,” she told him. “Pride can be a good thing, I think. But you mustn’t let it stop you from doing what makes you happy.”

Diego stared down at their joined hands. His slick with sweat and bleeding a little where a knuckle had split, hers as smooth and synthetically perfect as the first day he’d met her.

How could anyone think she was just a machine, he wondered?

“That’s all I ever wanted for you children, you know.” Her tone was the funny blend of conspiratorial and tender that he understood meant she was speaking straight from her electronic heart. “For you to be happy.”

Diego swallowed against the lump in his throat.

…Alright.

Alright.

{}{}{}{}{}

“You’re so cu-u-ute!” the little boy cooed, folding the dog’s ears in on themselves and pulling her head down for a kiss.

The dog wagged her tail in short, tight strokes in an effort to be polite.

Luther had been making forlorn comments for weeks about dog pee being bad for grass, and so, in the spirit of brotherhood, Five had gotten out the rope, put a slice of ham in his pocket for emergencies, and taken the dog to the park.

It was going every bit as badly as he had expected.

“Don’t pull on him, honey,” the boy’s mother called from the bench where she was reading a magazine. “Dogs don’t like that.”

The kid pressed his face into the dog’s, so that his right ear was nearly in her mouth.

She did not bite it off. Five supposed that was a good quality in a companion animal—a disinclination to maul children.

“Dogs like balls,” he said with authority. He looked up at Five. “Skipper likes balls.”

Who the fuck was Skipper? Five suspected that he himself had been this illogical and incoherent at age four, but he thanked God that he didn’t remember it.

“This dog doesn’t like balls,” he said. “This dog likes to chase people when they run away from her and don’t look back.”

“Oh.”

The boy thought about it for a second, and then he was sprinting through the grass as fast as his pathetic little toddler legs could carry him.

The dog looked up to Five in gratitude.

“You’re welcome.” He gave the rope a gentle tug. “Let’s go.”

It was a nice evening. The humidity of the day had evaporated as the sun set, and the treeline was lush and still against the darkening sky. As they strolled around the little pond in the park’s east corner, a one-eyed possum waddled out from a bush to lay claim to half of a discarded pretzel, and the dog barked at it once.

Five watched as the thing scampered away.

“Are _you_ why our trashcans never get knocked over anymore?” he asked the dog. “You’re very good at protecting garbage, I’ll give you that.”

Her tail wagged modestly.

They did one more lap around the pond, and then the dog veered off course and pulled determinedly in the direction of the house.

“Oh, are we done walking?” Five asked, amused in spite of himself. “Fine. All you had to do was say so.”

He let her guide him back the way they’d come, through the trees.

“My wandering days are behind me, too,” he admitted, ducking under a branch. “Everyone thinks I should get out more, but I’ve done enough of that for several lifetimes. I’m happiest at home—that’s the only place I’ve ever truly wanted to be, I think.”

Back on the path, he spotted a lamppost with one of the ‘Found Dog’ fliers he had put up some weeks earlier. He paused to examine it. None of the tabs with their phone number at the bottom had been torn off.

Five wondered, all of a sudden, whether anyone had ever filed a missing person report on him after his great leap through time.

The dog glanced behind her to check that he was still there. Her floppy lips parted to let her tongue hang out, almost like a smile.

It was grotesque.

He tore down the flier.

“Come on,” he said, crumpling it up. “If you stop pulling your leash, I’ll let you have the pocket ham when we get home.”

{}{}{}{}{}

{}{}{}{}{}

Vanya was expecting Mom to answer the door, but it was Klaus who flung it open, wearing a gold lamé bathrobe that was open to expose his chest and a pair of denim booty shorts.

The overall effect was very Hugh-Hefner-at-the-disco. Somehow, it looked less ridiculous on him than it should have.

“O-ho, a visitor!” he greeted her, striking a pose in the doorway. “What’s the password?”

“I like your outfit?” she guessed.

He stepped back and gestured her inside.

Allison was still in Florida, obviously, and now that Luther had gone to join her there, she had been dropping increasingly broad hints that Vanya should go check in on things at the house.

 _I hope everyone’s getting along okay over there,_ she had said. _I hope Klaus is eating and Diego’s getting enough sleep and Ben got home safe. I hope Five didn’t do anything to that dog._

Vanya just hoped she’d be satisfied that she had stopped by and confirmed they were all still alive. Snooping was not her forte.

“How have you been?” she asked Klaus as she trailed him to the living room.

“Perfectamundo!” He spun around and did jazz hands while walking backwards. “My tan is finally right how I want it. Don’t I look sun-kissed?”

“You look good,” she confirmed, smiling at how he preened at the compliment.

He looked leagues better than the last time she’d been over. She had honestly thought, for a moment, that he had fallen off the wagon, but Five had assured her he was only having a multi-day meltdown over the ‘new powers’ stuff.

She had some experience with that herself. All it took was time.

In the living room, Dave was trying to argue with an umpire through the television screen, and Ben was sitting cross legged on the sofa with both cats in his lap.

His face split into a beaming smile as Dave offered her a distracted wave. “Vanya! Hi!”

“Hey, guys.” She stooped down to hug Ben. Merry the cat blinked up at her indignantly at the intrusion.

“How was your trip?”

“Great,” he said with a contented sigh. “Just, so great. And then my flight back got cancelled so I spent two days wandering around airports trying to catch the right connections, and that wasn’t so great. But it was a net positive.”

Klaus, who had lit a cigarette, blew a ring of smoke at the ceiling. “Our fool-proof communication system failed,” he said. “Next time, we’re going with skywriting.”

“That wasn’t a foul,” Dave told the TV mournfully. “This game is rigged.”

Klaus patted his shoulder as he sashayed past him to the sofa.

“How about you?” Ben played with the tip of one the cat’s tails. “What have you been up to?”

“Nothing much. Practicing. Teaching.” Vanya perched on the edge of an armchair and knotted her hands together. They were all right here. She should go for it. “And I’ve been… seeing someone.”

Klaus sat up at attention, like a bloodhound who smelled an injured rabbit. “Oh?”

“Yeah.” She crossed her ankles to stop jiggling her legs. “For a while now, actually.”

Ben looked up from where he was pumping his cat’s paws like she was riding a bicycle. “Are you going to introduce her to us?”

Dave turned away from the TV, while Klaus’s gaze flicked between Vanya and Ben.

“Her?” he repeated.

“I mean… them?” Ben backpedaled. “The person you’re dating. Who could be anyone! We don’t know.”

Vanya frowned. “Did Diego say something?”

“Diego?” asked Klaus. “Did you tell Diego about this before you told me?”

“No, no!” Ben promised. “Diego would never—He didn’t say anything. About anything. Not that, uh. Not that there’s anything to say. About. Things.”

“Luther, then?” she asked.

“You told _Luther_ before you told me?”

“No!” Ben insisted, looking like he regretted ever opening his mouth. “I just… It was an accident, okay? I wasn’t spying on you or anything—“

“You’ve been _spying_ on people and not telling me?”

“—but I went over to your apartment one day while Klaus was taking a nap because I wanted to hear you play the violin—“

“You _visit family_ without telling me? How deep does this web of lies and betrayal run?!”

“—and you had this girl over, and she seemed…” Ben held out his hands helplessly “…pretty comfortable there? I don’t know, I walked in and then I walked right back out. I never mentioned it to anybody!”

Klaus crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the floor. “You don’t need to rub it in,” he muttered.

“Comfortable how?” asked Vanya.

He didn’t mean…

Ben cringed. “She was hanging out on your sofa in her underwear?”

Vanya rubbed a hand over her face.

Alright. She was here to play Allison, and Allison was always talking about bright sides and silver linings, so… at least her brother hadn’t seen her girlfriend buck naked.

“It’s okay,” she told Ben. “Just, um… maybe don’t go to my apartment when I can’t see you? Please?”

“Yeah, I never did it again after that,” he said hastily. “It was rude. I’m sorry.”

“I’m not mad,” she reassured him. “But... I’m not sure how Katie’s going to feel about it, so… let’s not bring this story up.”

“Well, _I’m_ mad!” Klaus stomped both feet on the floor in frustration. “Do Allison and Five know about your sapphic side, too? Why am I the last person to find out?”

“I’m… ninety-nine percent sure it’s my _only_ side,” Vanya admitted. “But you were busy with other stuff. Levitation and all.”

Also, Klaus had met Katie once, just for a moment, and it hadn’t gone great. She’d been leaving Vanya’s apartment as Klaus and Diego were arriving to take her to rehearsal, and she had accidentally called him ‘Karl’ twice in rapid succession.

She was really hoping that he would have forgotten about that by the time they all got together for dinner. It wasn’t an unreasonable wish—Klaus had holes in his memory big enough to drive a dump truck through.

Ben’s face scrunched up. “Levitation?” he asked. “What are you talking about?”

“Oh!” Klaus twisted around on the sofa. “Did I not tell you about that?”

As he launched into the story—Vanya had heard it several times now, and it got more dramatic with each retelling—Dave came up behind her and brushed a hand over her shoulder.

She looked up at him.

“Mazel tov,” he said sincerely. “This stuff isn’t easy, I know.”

“Thanks.” She twisted her hands together. “I... Maybe I shouldn’t have worried about it so much. I just didn’t want to surprise anyone, I guess.”

Dave smiled and grasped her shoulder again. “Vanya. I was more surprised when I found out you had been dating men up until now.”

Vanya looked down at her sensible shoes, her baggy flannel shirt, her blunt, unpainted nails.

…Yeah. Okay.

She could see it.

{}{}{}{}{}

Allison stared out into the yard, the glass of the backdoor fogging with each short, terrified breath she took.

“We must have forgotten to close the gate,” she whispered.

“Sorry,” Luther replied automatically, his gaze fixed outside.

“No, I’m not blaming you,” she told him. “I’m just saying.”

They both watched the horrorshow in the yard for a minute more.

Luther drew in a breath. “We need to trap it somehow,” he announced, “before it gets in your pool.”

The thing raised its monstrous head from the ground and swept its scaled tail across the terrace in preparation to move.

Allison didn’t have the ability to communicate with animals, but she knew, on an instinctive level, that this was how an alligator said _‘Try me, bitch.’_

“Or it can just _have_ the pool,” she suggested. “It can take my car, too, if it feels like it. The rest of my breakfast. My wallet. Whatever it wants.”

Luther shook his head. “I saw this show about alligators,” he said, pressing the heels of his palms together to mimic a mouth. “The muscles they use to open their jaws aren’t that strong, so as long as you have a good grip on them, you’re safe.”

Allison smiled at him. “Did you do research before you came down here?”

“Well, I…” He scratched at his nose, which was dusted pink. “Do you have duct tape?”

“Probably, but I’m not giving it to you.” She turned away from the door. “We are not animal wranglers, Luther. I’m sure there’s a number to call for this kind of stuff, like… like an alligator hotline.”

“The show said they’re way more dangerous if you’re trying to catch them in water,” he argued. “We’ll just—secure it, and then—“

“We’re not securing the alligator!” she laughed. “It isn’t a piece of luggage.”

It was a modern-day dinosaur that wanted to take her pool by eminent domain, and she was not about to argue.

Allison padded across the kitchen and pulled the white pages down from the top of the fridge. “Okay,” she said, thumbing through it. “Should I look under ‘Pest Control’ or ‘Emergency Numbers,’ do you think?”

There was a soft metal clinking sound, and the rasp of leather against fabric, and when she looked up, Luther had taken his belt off and was fastening it into a loop.

“I’m going to do it,” he said, with an unusual determination. “I’m securing the alligator.”

“No!” she insisted. “It can stay unsecured for now. I am fully on board with the alligator being loose cargo.”

Luther slid the door open. “It’s fine,” he promised. “They’re not even that fast on land.”

“LUTHER!”

Allison skirted around the table, but he was already outside, and oh, God, she could not watch. She pressed her hands over her eyes, pulse pounding.

Jesus, what was he _thinking?_ She’d always figured it would be Klaus or Diego to come home minus a finger one day, not her hesitant, play-it-safe Luther.

The door slammed back into place, and she peeked through her hands.

He was standing there with his back pressed to it, the alligator directly behind him on the other side, waddling awkwardly, angrily back and forth.

“Okay,” he said, chagrined. “So it turns out they’re _pretty_ fast on land.”

Allison let out a breath. “You almost gave me a heart attack,” she said, annoyed. “What the fudge, Luther? You have more sense than that.”

“I just…” His lips quirked a little. “Hey, you know that every time you talk to Claire on the phone, you start using fake swear words afterwards? It’s kind of funny.”

“Oh, okay, how’s this—what the _fuck,_ Luther?”

He shifted his weight around, looking embarrassed. “Well… I’ve been trying to do more things, you know? Be less boring, I guess. And I usually wouldn’t try to secure an alligator, so…” He shrugged. “I figured, why not?”

“Because it might eat you,” she pointed out.

Luther winced. “Yeah.” He looked over his shoulder at it. It opened its mouth and stared at him, unblinking. “There is that.”

Allison stepped forward to take his hand. “And listen—you’re not boring. If you want to get out of your comfort zone more, that’s great, but you don’t have to do anything crazy. I mean, we haven’t jumped out of any airplanes or gone drag racing this week, and we’re still having a lot of fun, aren’t we?”

Luther smiled at her, and relaxed. “Yeah,” he agreed. “We are.”

Then, voice tinged with regret, “This would have made such a good story, though.”

She laughed. “I won’t tell anybody we called the alligator hotline for backup if you won’t.”

“Wait, does that actually exist?” he asked. “Like, seriously?”

“Yep!” She grabbed the phone book off the table and tapped the page. “There is a literal hotline for alligator problems. With alligator professionals on standby to accommodate all of your alligator needs.”

Luther studied it in disbelief. “Florida is a wild place,” he said, voice full of wonder.

{}{}{}{}{}

Klaus raised his scissors from Ben’s hair and snipped them in the air.

“I got it!” he announced. “Concussions R Us!”

At the patio table, Diego made a note on his pad of paper. “That’s a terrible name for a gym.”

“I think it’s punchy.” Klaus smiled. “Get it? Because boxing? Punchy? Oh my God, how I am this good at comedy?”

Dave flipped a page in the newspaper. “You’ve got a gift, sweetheart.”

“Please stop waving scissors so close to my face,” Ben implored nervously.

Klaus leaned down to whisper in his ear. _“Never.”_

After a whole summer of weird moods and therapeutic punching, Diego had emerged from the exercise room that morning like a gross, smelly butterfly bursting from its cocoon, and announced that he was going to buy the gym.

 _I can’t let everybody lose their jobs,_ he’d said. _We have some really good talent right now,_ he’d said. _Dad would have cut me out of his will over it,_ he’d said.

Now he needed a business plan, which Klaus was absolutely delighted and wholly unqualified to assist him with.

“Maybe I should fine people for leaving their towels on the floor in the locker room,” Diego mused, turning the pen over in his hands. “That drives me crazy.”

“At least you won’t have to pick them up anymore,” said Ben.

Diego gave him a blank stare.

“Because you’ll need to hire a new janitor?”

“Oh.” Diego looked off into the middle distance, gob-smacked. “Yeah. I guess you’re right.”

Klaus sucked in a breath. “Ass Pounders Incorporated!” he exclaimed, stomping his feet in excitement. “Call it Ass Pounders Incorporated!”

Diego shot him a dirty look while Ben edged away from the scissors.

“That sounds like a really grotty strip club. Or gay club. Or gay strip club.”

“I’d go to it,” Klaus insisted. “Not in any of my good clothes, but I’d go. Right, Dave? Wouldn’t you?”

“Sure,” he agreed. “I think I’d have to go to shul afterwards, though.”

“Evening,” a familiar, twangy voice called out, and then Ben yelped as Klaus dropped the scissors into his lap in shock.

He spun around on his heel to face the interloper. _“You!”_ he hissed.

“Me,” the old man confirmed, as unflappable as ever. “How’ve you all been?” 

“Good!” Ben told him. He had the audacity to look pleased to see him, as if he hadn’t ditched them all summer like a box of highway kittens. “We went to Rhode Island, and then I went to the Philippines, and Allison—you know Allison, right? Our sister? Allison Hargreeves? Of course you know her, she’s famous. Anyway, she’s in—“

“NO,” Klaus interrupted furiously. “No updates! You forfeited the right to updates! Where have you _been,_ you deadbeat?”

“Australia, mate.” 

Diego scanned the empty space next to him. “What’s going on?” he asked. “Is there a ghost? Why are you yelling at them?”

“Oh, well I guess that makes it okay, then!” Klaus gestured to him with a glare. “Harry Houdini here was just taking a surprise world tour on the soul train, guys! Call off the search party!”

“Wait, is the ghost of Harry Houdini actually here?” Diego looked to Ben. “Is that him? For real?”

“Of course not,” said Ben, sounding disappointed in him.

The old man shook his head. “Don’t see what’s a surprise about it,” he said. “I told you I was going. More than once.”

Klaus crossed his arms. “Well, I _wasn’t listening!”_ he said self-righteously. 

Dave folded up the newspaper. “Alright,” he soothed. “Just a misunderstanding. Let’s move on, yeah?”

“How?” Klaus snapped. He glowered at the old man. “Do you know what happened while you were away? Do you know what you made us do?”

He sat down in the empty chair by Dave. “S’pose you’re about to tell me.”

_“We started a fire and I learned to fly!”_

The old man sighed wearily. “Sounds about right.”

Ben kicked at Klaus’s foot. “We also did some traveling,” he said, with a hint of reproach. “Allison’s making a movie in Florida. Luther’s on his way back from visiting her right now. Five got a dog, and we’re going to meet Vanya’s girlfriend once everybody’s home. And Diego is buying the gym he works at! We’re helping him make a business plan.”

Diego stiffened in his chair. “Wait, if this isn’t Harry Houdini, who is it?” he asked warily. “You don’t have to give him my life story.”

The old man crossed one leg over his knee. “Nothing quite like owning your own business,” he said with approval. “How’s it coming along, then?”

Ben turned to Diego. “He wants to know what you have so far.”

Diego, still suspicious, looked down at his paper. “Uh… Well, I was thinking I’d ask the guy who stocks the vending machine to start adding three flavors of Gatorade instead of two.”

The old man closed his eyes for a moment. “Christ Almighty,” he muttered, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Alright. Let’s get to it. First, he’s going to want to have a look at their tax records—“

Klaus retrieved his scissors and snipped moodily at Ben’s hair while Corpse-odile Dundee gave Diego a crash course in small business ownership.

He was relieved the geriatric fuck was back bossing everyone around and all, but he’d caused him a _lot_ of grief while he’d been gone.

He needed to start writing stuff down.

…Maybe starting with his real name.

{}{}{}{}{}

Ben leaned back in his father’s desk chair.

“So what time do you think you’ll get home?”

“Around four, maybe?” Luther told him through the phone. “Depends on traffic, I guess.”

“Cool.” Ben spun the chair idly in a circle. “Where are you right now? At a hotel or something?”

“Sort of. It’s this little roadside place somewhere in North Carolina, but it’s um. Not fancy enough to call it a hotel, I don’t think.” Luther paused, then added, with mingled amusement and embarrassment, “There’s a mirror on the ceiling over the bed. Which vibrates if you put a quarter in it, by the way.”

Ben laughed into the phone. “Sounds fancy to me.”

“Yeah. Well, it is kind of nice out here, though.” There were muffled sounds in the background on Luther’s end. “It’s amazing how clear the sky is, away from the city. I can see the moon so well.”

Ben turned in the chair to look out the window.

It was pretty incredible, he mused, that every person who had ever lived had been looking at the same moon. Like, Julius Caesar, and a caveman, and the guy who’d invented the microwave, and every random little person whose name was lost to history—same moon.

It would be eleven in the morning in the Philippines right now. But it was always there, and if Cora happened to be looking closely at the sky right now, she would see it, too.

“It’s pretty clear here, actually,” Ben said.

“Oh, nice.” Luther yawned. “I’m going to be so happy to get home. I mean, traveling was great and all, though. I’m glad I went.”

Ben gazed out the window a moment longer, smiling softly.

“Me too.”

{}{}{}{}{}

“Sit still,” Five ordered, closing one eye as the dog laved her tongue over the side of his face. “You’ll get outside a lot faster if you cooperate, you know.”

She shoved her nose into his ear instead.

This was going to be so much easier when he had a real leash, he thought distractedly, struggling to knot the rope around her collar. It was a good thing they were heading out now to buy one.

“I expect you to be on your best behavior at the pet store,” he lectured her. “If you’re good, you can pick one thing to play with. Nothing with stuffing in it, I saw what you did to the cats’ bird toy.”

The phone there in the foyer rang. Five stood up, letting the rope drop to the floor, and the dog whined in indignation.

“Patience,” he said as he answered the call.

She grumped at him and then parked herself on his feet, as if to make sure he wouldn’t forget about their walk.

“Who is this?” he demanded.

Ben and Luther kept telling him that was an unnecessarily hostile way to answer the telephone, but he thought it was best to let the caller know straight away that he was not going to be taken in by any telemarketing scams. Saved time all around.

“Uh… hi,” an uncertain male voice greeted him. “Um. So, I saw this number listed on a notice about a dog somebody found, and it’s kind of a stretch, but… I think it might be _my_ dog.”

Five didn’t answer for a moment. “Do you?”

“Yeah,” the man told him. “It’s been two years since she ran away—we were out walking one day and she just booked it, and I never found her. So like I said, kind of a stretch. But the picture looks a lot like her. Her name was Mrs. Pennycrumb.”

“Mrs. Pennycrumb,” Five reiterated.

The dog cocked her head up at him, wagging her tail.

...Well, fuck.

“Could we meet up somewhere?” the guy was asking. “So I could see her in person? I think I’d know for sure if it was her or not, if I saw her.”

Five stared at the dog for a long minute.

She stared back with her tongue hanging out, as adoring as she was stupid.

He adjusted the phone next to his ear.

“Your dog is dead.”

“I… really?” the man asked, shocked. “But… what happened?”

“She stopped breathing.”

“Yeah, right, but… why?”

“I couldn’t say,” Five told him tersely. “The medical examiner thought an autopsy was unnecessary, if you can believe it. They didn’t think there was any reason to suspect foul play.”

There was a long silence on the other end. “Alright,” the man said in clipped tones. “Well, I wish I could say it’s been a pleasure.”

“So do I. Keep your next dog on a leash,” Five advised, and then he hung up.

He crouched down on the floor to scratch behind the dog’s ear. She reflexively brought her hind leg up to pantomime scratching, too. He made a mental note to ask the vet about it at their appointment—it had to be a neurological problem of some kind.

“You didn’t want to go back to him anyway, did you?” he asked.

She licked his hand.

Of course not. How happy could she have been with the kind of person who would give her a fool name like Mrs. Pennycrumb?

She wouldn’t be running away from _him_ anytime soon. Of that, Five was certain.

“Alright,” he said, reaching for the rope. “Let’s try this again. Sit still, Food.”

{}{}{}{}{}

Al squinted through his glasses at the last page of the letter of intent Diego had drafted, then tossed it onto his desk.

“The name stays the same and I’m keeping a set of keys,” he declared. “Other than that, you got yourself a deal.”

Diego shifted in his chair. Al’s musty-ass office wasn’t the most magical setting for his whole life to change, maybe, but his stomach was still full of butterflies.

 _I’m about to own a business,_ he though incredulously.

Shit, this was going to be _his_ musty-ass office soon.

He swallowed. “Cool.”

“Glad you came to your senses.” Al pulled off his reading glasses and toyed with the ear pieces. He smiled, a real smile, which Diego could count on one hand the number of times he had seen over the years.

“One more thing, Hargreeves,” he said. “If some down-on-his-luck kid ever comes in here, telling you he’ll sweep up the place in exchange for somewhere to sleep…”

He leaned across the desk to grip Diego’s shoulder.

“…tell him to pound sand. We ain’t zoned for that.”

Diego blinked.

“Could get you in a lot of trouble,” Al finished.

Diego smiled at him. “I cannot fucking _wait_ for your last day,” he said fondly.

{}{}{}{}{}

Allison resurfaced through the water and slicked her hair back.

The stupid, terrible movie was done, and tomorrow she’d fly to New York, so this was her last night in the rental house.

She thought she might miss it a little. It had been a comfort to have a real place to come back to at the end of the day, much better than living out of a hotel.

Also, this pool was amazing when it didn’t have alligators in it.

She floated on her back, looking up at the sky and running through the list of everything she needed to do before her flight.

Her clothes were mostly packed, she’d get her makeup put away tomorrow morning, the fridge was empty, the windows were closed…

…Did she need to take out the trash?

Allison frowned up at the stars. Ten weeks in Florida, and she still didn’t know which day they picked it up.

Screw this place. She _needed_ a housekeeper.

{}{}{}{}{}

Vanya propped her head up on her elbow against the pillow, and turned over in her bed.

“And Allison?” she prompted.

Kate glanced up at the ceiling from her book, running her lower lip between her teeth.

“Ah… Don’t bring up her powers, or the movie she’s making, or her daughter, unless she brings her up first,” she recited.

“Okay, good. Diego?”

Katie smiled at her. “Vee. I’ve met Diego a ton of times.”

“Still,” Vanya pressed.

She sighed. “Talk about boxing, don’t act like I’m interested in learning how.”

“Right. And if you get stuck…?”

“Ask Luther about his garden, or ask Karl where he got his outfit.”

 _“Klaus,”_ Vanya corrected despairingly.

“Shit, sorry!” Katie set her book down and laughed. “You know how, like, you get a thought stuck in your head and it won’t go away? I just, I can’t stop thinking his name is Karl.”

Vanya squeezed her wrist. “Make it go away,” she pleaded. “Names are kind of a sore spot. Oh—and no nicknames, either, okay? They’re… not super into that.”

“Oh.” Katie regarded her seriously. “Sorry, Vanya.”

She smiled into the blankets. “I don’t mind when _you_ do it.”

Katie reached over to boop her nose. “Good.”

They both fell silent. Katie turned a page in her book, and Vanya closed her eyes, focusing on the whir of the fan in her window.

“Oh, wait,” she said, pulling herself out of her half-asleep state. “Five? I know you’ve hung out with him here a bunch, but…”

“Don’t talk to him at all unless he talks to me first,” Katie replied without looking up from her reading.

Vanya snuggled back down into the sheets, content.

She was ready.

{}{}{}{}{}

“—for Claire’s first day of kindergarten,” Allison told Luther as they hauled her luggage through the parking garage. “So at least I’ll be here for Labor Day, but then I’m back on a plane.”

“Take pictures for us,” he said, leading them towards the van.

“I will! I figure, I’ll hang out in LA for a week or so, then I’ll fly out here again.” She laughed. “Because if I’m not spending half of my time in the air, then what am I even doing with my life? I don’t know who I am on land any—“

The van’s door slid open, and a bare-chested Klaus spilled out of it over Ben’s lap.

“Hi, Allison! Welcome home! Five has a gun, so watch out.”

“Uh…”

Five’s head popped out from the way back as Diego climbed out of the front passenger side.

“I found it under the seats,” he said, brandishing a handgun in the air. “I’ve been looking for this thing all year.”

Allison edged away. “Is it loaded?”

He snorted. “What good would it be if it wasn’t?”

Ben gently pushed his arm down. “We all wanted to surprise you at the airport,” he said in a strained tone. “So… surprise!”

Vanya’s arm waved at her from where she was hidden next to Five, and Dave shot her a quick smile as he folded up Klaus’s abandoned shirt.

Allison beamed at them. “That’s so sweet, you guys,” she said, with feeling. “It’s really great to see everybody—I missed you all.”

“We missed you, too,” Diego grunted, heaving one of her suitcases up to the roof and pointedly ignoring Luther’s hand extended in an offer to help.

Allison drank in the sight of them, all of them, crammed into a car to welcome her home.

“…Where am I going to sit, though?”

As they made their way out of the airport—Klaus perched in Dave’s lap, with his legs kicked out across Ben and Diego in the middle row—Allison twisted around in the front seat and began digging through the plastic bag she carried.

“I brought souvenirs,” she said.

Klaus punched the roof of the car in excitement. “Al- _right!_ TCHOTCHKES!”

“Okay, Vanya, here’s yours.”

She handed it to Ben to pass backwards. Vanya opened the little box and smiled.

“Did you get one, too?” she asked, holding up the bracelet.

Allison showed her the matching one on her own wrist. “I did! Now put it on, so we’ll both have worn them at least once.”

She fished around in the bag again while Five helped Vanya with the clasp.

“And for Luther, I got our best vacation photo framed!”

He was driving, so she showed it to the backseat instead of him.

“This is us with the alligator we secured, with no help or input from anyone else whatsoever,” she explained.

Luther’s shoulders tensed. “Right,” he agreed, a little nervously. “We, uh… We sure did that.”

Diego took it from her hand. “No shit?” he asked, awed.

“If nobody else was helping, who took the picture?” wondered Five.

She grabbed the next item from the bag. “And here’s yours,” she told him. “Up top!”

Five snatched it from the air and turned the packet around. “Watch batteries,” he said, sounding pleased. “Thanks.”

“Anytime.” She pulled out two keychains. “These are for Dave and Ben,” she said, handing them over. “I don’t know what you’re going to do with them, but here you go.”

“We’ll cherish them forever,” promised Dave, smiling.

“Or put keys on them,” Ben suggested.

“What’d you get me?” asked Klaus, vibrating in anticipation. “Is it a pony? Is it two ponies? You know what, fuck everything, please tell me it’s an even dozen ponies.”

Allison laughed. “Actually, I got you and Diego a joint gift,” she said, rifling through the bag. “Let me see… Oh, here!”

She pulled her empty hand out and gave them both the middle finger.

The enthusiasm slipped off of Klaus’s face by degrees. Vanya started to laugh in the far back, then pretended it was a cough when Diego turned around to glare at her.

“Do you like it?” Allison asked proudly.

“Love it,” Five called.

Klaus’s mouth parted in dismay. “This is a joke, right?” he demanded. “You did get us something?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. What did you get me in Rhode Island?”

Diego slouched in his seat. “Fair,” he muttered.

“No it’s not!” Klaus gestured between Ben and Dave. “They went, too!”

“I wanted to go to Florida,” Ben reminded him.

Dave dangled the keychain in front of Klaus’s nose. “Can I interest you in a timeshare arrangement with this keychain to make up for it?”

“You’re lucky I love you, David,” Klaus said huffily.

As they got onto the freeway, talk turned to other things.

Their upcoming dinner with Vanya’s girlfriend (“There’s a tapas place that just opened near us,” Luther told them. “We could try that.” “What the fuck even is tapas?” “I don’t know, that’s why I said we should try it.”).

Diego’s takeover of the gym (“The only thing I’m worried about is finding a new janitor.” “That’s like, the easiest part, dude.” “It’s not! You _have_ to have a good janitor, or else the whole place falls apart.”).

Dog-related developments (“So nobody ever called to claim her?” “…No.”).

The future of Space Day (“I’d do it again next summer if they ask, but I want a better activity than bottle rockets.” “Never managed to beat the volcano, huh?” “How could I? It’s a _volcano.”)._

Filipino cuisine (“—and they had this stew that was made of oxtail and peanut sauce that I want to try to make.” “Was it good?” “How would I know?”).

The development of Klaus’s powers (“I thought the other day that I was levitating again, but looking back, I’m pretty sure I was just dizzy.” “Dizzy from what?” “Well, I’d been seeing how long I could hold my breath before that.”).

And, finally, Allison’s movie (“The best thing I have to say about it is that it’s done. I wash my hands of it.” “Well… it still has to come out in theaters, doesn’t it? And you have to promote it, and—” “My hands are washed!”).

They had just started squabbling over what radio station to listen to when Klaus shook his fist at the window.

“Goddamn you, Big Lou!” he exclaimed. “Someday I’ll find out what your deal is!”

Allison wound a lock of hair around her finger. “I bet it’s like, a discount furniture place,” she said. “I don’t know, that’s just what the font makes me think of.”

“I was thinking barbeque restaurant,” Vanya piped up. “Like… Big Lou’s Barbeque? Right?”

“Snowglobe Emporium,” Klaus sighed out the window.

“That’s not a thing that exists,” said Ben.

“Prove it.”

Suddenly, without warning, Luther sliced across two lanes of traffic towards Exit 26.

“What are you doing?” Allison laughed, holding onto the hand grip to stop herself from pitching into the center console.

“Yeah, seriously?” Diego snapped as he rubbed the spot on his face Klaus had just kicked.

“We’re going to Big Lou’s,” Luther told them, steering down the exit ramp with all the purpose of a kamikaze pilot. “I’ve been looking at that sign all summer, and I want to find out what it is.”

Klaus started dancing on Dave and chanting “Road trip, road trip, road trip—“

“Uh… guys?” Vanya called from the back. “I think one of Allison’s suitcases fell off the roof.”

Diego crossed his arms. “It’s probably something stupid,” he said. “Like one of those warehouse places that sells tropical fish.”

“Oh, you think?” asked Ben. “I guess I kind of assumed it was a car dealership. Like, one of those off-brand ones with the inflatable guy waving his arms around?”

“ROAD TRIIIIIP!”

“Guys? The suitcase?”

“It belongs to the highway now,” Five told her.

Klaus smacked a kiss on Dave’s forehead. “Road trip,” he concluded. “That was my first single. It’s called ‘Road Trip.’”

“Sing it again,” Diego muttered.

“Record a Spanish version,” suggested Allison.

“Viaje por la carratera, viaje por la carratera, viaje—“

She laughed as Klaus sang, and Dave stroked his hair, and Ben wondered out loud if anybody else wanted to get a tank of fish, and Diego sat there looking as disgruntled as a wet cat even though he had nothing to be mad about, and Vanya tried to explain to Five why he probably shouldn’t keep an unregistered gun, and Luther flat out ignored them all because this was just another ordinary day in their lives, so why get upset?

Everything was as it should be.

_Home again, home again, jiggety-jig._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~The End~
> 
> Well, that's it, everybody! When I started writing this series, I didn't mean for it to be 18 parts and 150K+ words, but I had too much fun with it to stop. Now that season two is almost upon us, it's time to bring it to a close. Thank you all so much for reading and for all of your comments and support, it's meant the world to me. This is honestly the nicest, most collaborative and least toxic fandom I've ever participated in, and I'm looking forward to seeing you all again when everybody starts writing for the new season!

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't intend to make this a multi chapter story, but then I started writing and I couldn't stop. I also didn't intend to put images in it because I don't really art, and then I started making postcards and I couldn't stop that either. Is MS Paint super hard or am I just dumb? Send help.


End file.
